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So.
Are we supposed to feel something today? Some...passing of days, some aging?
Is a birthday supposed to be a celebration, a contemplation, a mourning? I've never quite figured it out. I've had good ones. Great ones. Awful ones. Ones where I've been in a more secure emotional place than I am today.
When I was...oh...7, I suppose...younger, maybe...I had a Star Wars birthday. I remember how cool everyone thought it was because the other girls were having Barbie and crap like that. I remember the year Erica and Liz took me to the Billy Joel/Elton John concert. I remember the year Ken sent me 24 roses--all different colors--and I had to leave a Circuit City management meeting to go get them. I remember two years ago, when we were in Paris. Or Brussels, maybe. I remember the year Robert wrote music around a poem I'd written and played it for me, softly, in the darkened auditorium at school.
I remember birthdays I've been in love and birthdays before I knew what love was. Days that passed with everyone remembering and days that passed with no one calling. How depressing they were. I tend to make a big deal out of birthdays...you know, no huge hoopla, but I make a point of remembering. When other people don't bother to remember, or don't care enough to remember, well, yeah. Of course it bothers you. How could it not?
Today, admittedly, it's hard to worry about my birthday when my mind is elsewhere. I stare at my computer screen and I can't think straight. Last night I tried to relax, to calm down...took a bath with the lovely new bath products and the beautiful candle Nick and Arnold gave me. No dice. I got out of the tub feeling just as unsettled. Normally I would think that the unsettled feeling is just the approaching of my birthday. This year, I know differently.
Is this the crossroads?
I am not Robert Frost. I can not casually stand here and ponder the road not taken. I can only ponder the roads yet to walk upon.
It would be easy to sit here and wallow in everything. I've been pretty good at that, the last few days. Today, though, my outlook is surprisingly detached from everything. I can step back and look at it rationally, at my life, and ponder its direction. It would be easier if we all lived backwards, like Merlin, right? Because you'd see the highest points first. You'd know what had happened to you. You just wouldn't know how you got there. And since that's the biggest question anyway: how do I get from point A to point B...or, wait. Is the biggest question what is point a? Or point B? And what they bring for us? And which do we choose?
Your life is full of doors, like that terrific song from "Closer Than Ever" says. What happens to you depends on what one you choose. There's always another choice, and life is full of chances. But when you think you already took yours, and others suddenly appear out of nowhere, how are you supposed to figure out what to do? Where to go?
I contemplate therapy sometimes. Reading back, this certainly sounds like I need it. But...people went for centuries without therapy, dealing with their own problems. I know the answers are inside me, so shouldn't I be able to find them on my own with no help?
But if I was able, wouldn't I already know?
Do I already know?
Birthdays.
A day to celebrate birth, yes? My mom sent me funny, lovely email. I'll quote from it here:
Eight hours of grueling labor! Plus the indignities they used to put you through all those years ago. It was barbaric, but look how you turned out. No squashed head, no chinese eyes (and two of them!) the correct amount of digits, and no facial hair. Happy Birthday Honey, I'm so glad you are not an albino hunchback dwarf (although I would love you anyway).
A day to think about the year past. Many things to be thankful for. Friends, old and new. Love in many forms. So much laughter. And the fact that I have Godspell rehearsal tonight is so heartening.
A day to remember, so much. Chris. I can only share my birthday with you here now, and in my memories. I loved you, so much. I always will.
A day to acknowledge, silently and not, those people who shape me. The people who make me who I am, or helped to make me who I am. Too many to write about here.
A day to love.
Happy birthday, me. What's ahead in your next year? I wish I knew.
But then...there would be no surprise. And without surprise, there's no wonder.
~*~Mel~*~
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