I Ordered a Flag and Got a Mirror Instead

I ordered a birthday flag this year.

Not for attention. Not for others.

Just for me.

After decades of shrinking, serving, surviving—

I wanted to mark a moment.

To say: I see you, Gin. You made it. You're worthy of celebration.

But when the flag arrived… it was small.

Comically small.

Twelve inches of polyester that couldn't possibly carry the weight of all I'd survived.

And yet… it showed me something bigger than I ever imagined.

It showed me what I really wanted:

To be seen.

To be honored.

To be witnessed by myself.

The flag wasn’t the failure.

It was the mirror.

Sometimes the sacred shows up looking like disappointment.

But only because it’s asking you to go deeper than the decoration.

What if the gift was never the flag?

What if the gift was this truth:

“I am the altar. I am the celebration. I no longer wait to be seen—I see myself.”

That’s the lesson.

That’s the legacy.

That’s the flag I now fly—inside.