The Birthday Blues
It’s my birthday today and I’m determined on drastic action: I’m going to enjoy this one.
I’ve had a chequered relationship with birthdays since turning twenty, a landmark which plunged me into despair because I dreaded quitting my teens. I didn’t know when I was well off - believe me, nastier milestones followed.
Self-fulfilling prophecies have a spiteful habit of coming true, so because I was expecting woeful repercussions each birthday, they happened right on cue.
On my 21st, devastated to be an official adult, I wandered around in a maudlin daze and had my pocket picked - losing the money I’d received for presents.
On my 25th birthday, dejected because I felt even more imprisoned by maturity, I left my keys in the lock - returning to find my flat burgled.
On my 30th I flew to Copenhagen to escape those fiendishly punning cards I knew were inevitable - and wallowed in such an excess of self-indulgent gloom my boyfriend dumped me. Naturally I’d been expecting it.
Fortunately this year’s birthday isn’t a significant one, when I’m particularly prone to misadventure, so I’m using it to re-educate myself. Birthdays are fabulous fun, that’s my new mantra. Wonder how long before the brainwashing takes effect?
The plain truth is I have an aversion to these anniversaries because I don’t like growing older. There, I’ve said it.
It’s vanity, of course, but something else too. Recognition of mortality.
Scrutinising my face, I’ve formed a fair impression of the reflection which will gaze back at me at seventy. While there’s nothing wrong with looking seventy, who among us wouldn’t prefer twenty?
The face of a 20-year-old was wasted on me at twenty. Then again, so was the face of a 30-year-old. I feel like shrieking ‘give it back, I’ll appreciate it this time’ but it doesn’t work that way.
Perhaps my requirements for a happy birthday have grown too lofty over time. I used to be thrilled by outfits for my Sindy doll, later by shoes I could scarcely totter in. Now I want a car. Or diamond earrings. Or a fairy godmother to spirit away the network of lines under my eyes.
My favourite birthday present was an angel for the Christmas tree chosen by myself. To my dismay, her leg fell off on the way home, but my father did a patch-up job. Three decades later I still stand on a chair to prop her at the summit of the tree.
Now, if I could recapture that sense of infinite riches because I had a plastic fairy with a rickety leg on the bus seat beside me, I’d be assured a happy birthday. But how do you pull that one off?
It hinges on reclaiming that hedonistic sense of excitement birthdays generate in children; their conviction that blue skies and a treasure trove of gifts await them. And they deserve both.
Maybe I should focus on the self-fulfilling prophecy and sit back, fingers crossed, anticipating sunshine and largesse.
On the other hand, I could always turn the mirror to the wall and go out to buy my own diamond earrings. Just to guarantee the happy birthday.
