The Arithmetic of Enough

A reflection on my birthday, the true meaning of wealth, and the gift of “enough.”

My birthday cake with the only “candles” my daughter could find.

First, thank you.

For the calls, the texts, the messages and cards; the gifts dropped on the porch; the quick “happy birthday” notes from people I haven’t seen in years. I felt held. After 45 years, I am still learning how to receive kindness, but I’m learning. So thank you.

My son wanted this birthday to be a celebration. Weeks ago I heard him conspiring with my wife. I grew up with simple ones. Pick a meal, a cake, that’s that. My wife grew up with two birthdays most years (as a child of divorce), and all the extra that can bring. We’ve met in the middle over time.

This year, the kids ran to the store after school, called me twice to ask for money for my “surprise” (which made me laugh), took me to a little Mexican place, and then came home to bake my grandmother’s carrot cake (the same cake I used to ask for when I was their age). We didn’t have candles, so my daughter made paper flames on toothpicks. We sang anyway.

Four hands icing a cake from four generations back. That felt like wealth.

I don’t mean the kind with commas and zeros. I mean the kind you can taste, and sit with, and share in crooked slices on chipped plates. The kind that makes the room feel larger even when you’re at the same small table.

I’ve been asked how 45 feels. Here it is, plain: 44 broke me open; 45 feels like an unearned Sabbath. And Sabbath was never about earning in the first place.

When I was 18, I told my mother I thought the world’s story about wealth was a trick. Work more to get more so you can finally rest… later. When you retire. Maybe. If everything holds. It felt like being told to sprint the first forty miles of a marathon and trust that the last six will be a meadow with a breeze. I didn’t want that story. I still don’t.

Then I read the gospels for myself. Not the verses people threw like darts, but the whole thing. I met Jesus there; dust in the hems, bread in the hands, eyes on the birds and the wildflowers and other forgotten things. Life, he kept saying, is not measured by what you store. The table matters more than the vault. The kingdom sounds like dinner with the wrong people and enough to go around.

That’s a different arithmetic of life. Wealth not as winning, but as enough.

Enough looks like time to sit under a tree and breathe. Enough looks like your kids calling you twice for surprise money and you sending it, because the surprise is them trying. Enough looks like a carrot cake you didn’t buy, made with a recipe you didn’t write, served with laughter you didn’t manufacture. Enough looks like quiet mornings where you can hear your own heart settle. Enough looks like your spouse’s name on your tongue and your phone set down.

If I’m honest, I’ve spent years half-inside the other story. Producing, proving, chasing, worrying. I know how quickly a day gets priced and sold. I also know the relief of stepping off the treadmill and realizing the ground is still there, and it’s kinder than you remembered.

So this is a thank-you note, but it’s also a small confession and a small theology.

The confession: I’ve measured myself by the wrong ruler more often than I want to admit. I’ve called scarcity by the name “responsible.” I’ve treated presence like a luxury item.

The theology: true wealth is belonging. Wealth is being known and still welcomed. Wealth is bread that multiplies when it’s broken and shared. Wealth is time that is not billable. Wealth is the feel of a hand on your shoulder when you didn’t ask for it. Wealth is laughter you didn’t plan. Wealth is the ordinary, blessed and seen.

This doesn’t pay the bills. I know. We all live in the world we live in. Money buys groceries and keeps the lights on. But I’m trying, slowly and imperfectly, to stop asking money to tell me who I am. I’d rather let the people around my table tell that truth, and let God whisper it in the quiet: you are enough, there is enough, come sit down.

So, to everyone who reached out: thank you for spending a little of your life on me. For the messages, the gifts, the notes, the time. You gave me a day full of “enough,” and I am grateful.

And to those who need the line I needed: you do not have to earn your Sabbath. You can begin from rest. Start where the cake is warm and the candles are paper and the song is off-key and perfect.

Because maybe wealth, at least the kind that lasts, is this simple:
a table,
two or three gathered,
a story you’ve heard before but needed again,
and the taste of sweetness you didn’t buy…
only received.

What does “enough” look like to you?