Finding Joy in Snarkville

If you are here seeking some fun snark or perhaps some lighthearted humor, then today is not the day to visit. Today would be the day to bring the booze, the bitching, and join my little pity party.

However, there are ground rules (It’s my party, I set the rules). First, the phrase, “it is ONLY a day” is not allowed at ALL. Second, if you don’t understand my pity party, please move along there is nothing to see here. Third, if you are not stroking my hair, telling me how much you love me, and how the cruel the world is (read: trying to put it into perspective for me) — I pretty much don’t want to hear from you either. Hey, folks, its a PITY party, what did you expect food and happy talk? Sorry, I’m fresh out of happy (though I fear I’ve got a whole lot of crazy).

Let me paint the picture for you. I’m sitting in my living room. It is late by our standards and all the lights are off. My left foot hurts because as I was navigating in the dark I stumbled over a piece of furniture that didn’t move (I know I should have turned on a light). Finally, I’m pondering. and pondering. and pondering.

As far back as I can remember, I’ve been a little nutty about my birthday. I don’t really remember when it wasn’t a big deal to me. Yes, even in those crazy teen years when I tried so hard to be angry all the time and act like nothing was important. I think it was probably my early teens when it first happened. I thought I had begun to learn humility and graceousness (or at least I was trying them on for size). I must have told my parents that I didn’t want a big deal made of my birthday (there’s a wee part of me that thinks I might have attempted to grow up a bit and try to play down how huge my birthday is to me). My birthday that year, I got a card. I’m 99% sure I picked out what my father made for dinner, but I can’t for the life of me remember what it was. I was heartbroken. While I had *SAID* I didn’t want a big deal made, I did. I always have. Late that night (it is a horrible habit I have, I don’t open up to talk until the wee hours — seems to carry into blogland too), I talked to the Queen Mum about it. She told me that no one can read my mind and I got exactly what I asked for — what she actually said was you can’t ask for something and then get mad when you get exactly what you asked for. I think she was taken back by me being upset. I don’t think she, at the time, realized that I wasn’t mature enough to handle the “no big deal” birthday, despite my request.

Over the years I’ve tried to do the “its no big deal” thing and frankly, I get disappointed and go to bed holding back tears. Folks, I’m nearly 33 years old and I still feel this way. I beat myself up over it too. I mean, shouldn’t I be able to put my big girl pants on and get over it already. Afterall the logical side of me knows that no one on this planet understands or thinks my birthday is as big a deal as I want them to. I know this; it doesn’t mean I’ve ever accepted it well.

A friend asked me tonight if I’ve had a history of bad birthdays. I thought about it and said, “well, actually, yes, sort of.” Here’s the thing, I’ve never had anything tragic happen. I never ended up in the hospital or anything. However, I’ve had a history of disappointing birthdays. I so desperately want to go through the full list, but frankly I can’t face it. Let me leave it at this Prince and I have been married 7 years. While he’s been with me (as in the same state at least) for 5 of those, I can say one was pretty neat — when I wasn’t being nuts and all. The first two after we married, he was on a trip for. I was home, depressed. The third one, we were supposed to go camping for, he had to work suddenly because buildings fell 5 days earlier. The fourth one we threw our house warming party about the same time and I baked a cake — someone thought it would be a FINE idea to try to pass it off as my birthday cake. The fifth was the one I had just had a baby for and well, it was mostly forgotten. The sixth we were on a ship crossing the Atlantic. I was over tired from lack of good sleep and a schedule I wasn’t used to — I picked a horrible fight (yes, I admit I picked it, and ruining my birthday was all my fault). Last year, we set off on our move on.my.birthday. As much as I tried to be the big girl on that one — it didn’t sit well with me — I hated that I spent my whole day basically alone in a car listening to books on tape.

So this year, this year, it was going to be different. I was going to let everyone know I wanted a big deal made. I wanted it to be fun and festive. I didn’t want to be sick for it. And I most certainly didn’t want a phone call at 3pm today telling me that Prince had to work that day — the whole day.

There will be no 7:30am meeting for me. There will be no seeing my friends at my yarn store for me (a meeting of my SockAnon club — which I’ve missed all the meetings of because of the Prince’s work schedule). There will be no date night. There will be no dinner at the most recommended place in town for me.

I know, the logical side of me again, that I could do most of those things another night. But frankly, I go out to eat at least once a week. It isn’t that special to me — other than to do it ON my birthday. I like to do SOMETHING special on the actual day. Yes, I’m using the logic of a toddler. Yes, I’m acting like a big baby about it — but something I wanted was basically stolen away from me and I’ve not even had 12 hours to deal with it.

I’m hurt, I’m sad, I feel like my balloon poped….I’m all of the things I’d rather not be right now. I want to be the big girl who understands. I want to be the person that is ok with this. But I’m not. I’m just not. And no, I’m not really in the mood to make someone else feel better about it either — I’m still too raw.

I really want to grow up and be the person where their birthday isn’t a big deal to them — but I’m apparently not that mature yet. I still want the big deal. I still want the hype. I don’t want to be alone. (And yes, I realize Duke is my date for the evening — but his night ends at 7:30pm, what a party animal).

I’m taking a break from my wish today — because I don’t think I could wish for anything more than “I want MY day back.” Perhaps I’ll go back to wallowing in my pity party — anyone have a Kleenex.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 15th, 2006 at 1:02 am and is filed under I say it's my birthday., The Queen. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.