Birthday Melancholia

I am entirely sentimental.

The handwriting of everyone I have ever known well enough to receive a card, a note or a letter from sits in a box stowed safely under my bed. Treasured and protected, Re-read upon occasion. Remembered when most needed or looked to when I inevitably begin to consider myself too harshly. This Box has had her looks, once pink and glittered she overflowed and at 11 a deep blue took her place, more mature of course and surprisingly sturdy, working hard to protect precious inhabitants. She grew once more since then in a late growth spurt I can only hope might be catching, and now my little library of love is once again wrapped up in a parcel of pink satin and crepe.

I can’t imagine there will be a time without a box, but before it my brother and I had all of our cards displayed pretty much year round.

We slotted their spines along the slats of the wooden folding blinds in our room, their covers stood outward facing and proudly presented. With each year and or milestone their locations could shift, rearranged to align with whatever colour scheme I was going for or decorations I had taken upon myself to introduce to the space, but they were always always within reach.

I am a passionate lover of cake.

Carrot cake most specifically. If ever you wanted to do a Melbourne carrot cake food tour I would be your girl. I would (and will) accompany you emphatically on a day dedicated to my favourite treat, 5+ locations at least, all beautiful bakes but entirely different from each other (Carrot cake is a spectrum)

I am aware however, that carrot cake is polarising. You kind of love it or hate it, and while I was blessed with no dietary restrictions (putting aside my somewhat optional lactose intolerance) my brother is riddled with almost every nut allergy under the sun so more often than not, we sub out the carrot and I settle for choccie - Which I don’t know if would really consider settling at all.

I am blessed to have friends that I have known since I was 2 years old, Before I was even conscious and in any way aware of how fortunate it is to have constants in your life. I have experienced countless joys and occasions with them, milestones and growth, which is so truly special, but alongside that blessing comes the curse of these girls not just remembering every good thing I have ever done, my proudest moments and achievements but they also shave the knack to remember and remind me of every embarrassing thing I’ve ever done. They bring up the stupid arguments I’ve initiated, disastrous attempts at ball sports (or simple hand-eye coordination) and moments that I may have otherwise successfully wiped from my own memory. Still, they were there for all of it.

As we have grown, the time between seeing each other grew more and more distant, fewer and farther between. Our circles expanded and new faces learned the new phases of us and we now share them in stories of these lives lived separately between meetings. The time we spend together may be sparing, but it is all the more magical that we have gone 17 years alongside eachother and no matter how long we go without sighting one another it takes barely five minutes for us to start yapping away as we always have, and arguing like sisters as we always will.

For these girls, and all of those that I love, to carve out quality time is an EFFORT, but to see my people, and be comforted by their company is one of my favourite things in the world.

I am turning 19 tomorrow (technically today), and for a girl who loves, a cake, a card and quality time, you would think my birthday would be exciting

but in truth, I don’t really like my birthday.

Ah! I know I’m my own personal party pooper! Still, there are a lot of elements which go into my milestone anxiety.

Exhibit A,

I am a birthday crier.

Every year without fail, at some point (let’s be honest, at multiple points) I will cry. Probably the week before too. August rolls around like my own personal onion, except I cannot find it in myself to wear swim goggles for 30 days straight, hence: tears & those tears present themselves for many different reasons. Some out of anxiety, some a halfhearted happiness and others a strange sort of grief for a version of myself that can no longer exist.

Annually I slip into a birthday melancholia where any mention of my aging could send me into a spiral. Fabulous isn’t it.

Don’t get me wrong, the opportunity for gathering, spending time with the people I love, and being a little bit silly-fun-goofy-ridiculous is EXCITING, but the occasion which makes those events not just justifiable but expected, presents as the very opposite.

So Yes, I am turning 19 tomorrow

and I don’t know if I’m excited, to be totally honest I think I am afraid.

I am afraid of a number that is inevitable.

A number that has always appeared auspicious and grand yet remains largely undocumented. For every movie I have watched about a girl who turns 16, there is twofold the story of her 18 year old senior and even more for the 21 year old finding her new found freedom, but I can hardly remember any films that focus on living out the awkward transition from being a technical adult/teenager and going on to enter into true early adulthood.

I am afraid that I am not growing up and into a better person. That maybe I am not growing up at all but sideways or in a circle.

Perpetually stuck on the same things.

Picking Pimples in the same spots

Hating the same things about my body

Constantly searching to soothe the same fears.

I am afraid that nothing I do or say will leave a lasting impact, that I will fail to communicate something new or of value. That maybe I am not and will not grow and learn, but windup mindlessly regurgitating and repackaging story after story, placing things that I have already lived through into pretty boxes to reopen them later and notice they have not aged into maturity but grown stale and insignificant.

a bit extreme,

honest,

scary.

but what if I am just another year older and none the wiser? As far as I’m aware it’s all quiet on the frontal lobe and I am still waiting for the day when I wake up and feel older.

It appears, that a birthday is supposed to mark something drastically new,  but one of my main issues with them is that although that day marks a new number, I don’t necessarily feel any different in the moment.

When I was little, after a birthday my parents were constantly having to remind me how old I was. A stranger would ask and I genuinely looked around with no clue. I took a month long buffer period to get my head on straight, because then age didn’t really mean anything.

The number and the days stacking on top of one another, tearing through another calendar or year didn’t really do anything until ages started bringing expectations, until I began to understand that youth was desirable and ageing meant that I would have to outgrow the things I loved as they were deemed to be too juvenile if I were to be mature.

Today, I don’t feel entirely different from yesterday and tomorrow I don’t imagine I will either but give it six months, and I’ll  zoom out, look back and realise that I am so estranged from the girl I am right now and even more so from the child that I once was despite trying to hard to remain in contact with her.

To remain in contact with my self.

I go through hurdles of feeling, despite all this effort, that I have a tendency for floating through my life outside of myself. To remove my brain from my body and let my figure breeze through the world without the weight of overthinking and paranoia that my mind would impose.

On a birthday, ohh yeah, on a birthday it is quite the contrary as I am jolted back to the present and brought down to earth alongside the weight of everything I have either done or not done, any choice I could make that I didn’t, or one that I did make but I shouldn’t have and how different or better my life could appear if I hadn’t.

Unlike new years, where these realisations or reflections spark an influx of resolutions,  goals and every second person starting 75 hard on January first, on your birthday you are largely left to process these unsavoury emotions alone. Internally struggling while  simultaneously encircled by people who love, care for and want to celebrate you.

So then comes the feeling that maybe you should be happy because it is your birthday and people are celebrating you.

Babe, Why aren’t you happy? You can be happy. Just be happy! and it almost feels like you need to be, even when you’re not trying to be miserable. Yet, there is then an element of performance introduced to the already delicate art of a birthday party, dinner or celebration.

This idea of obligation and requirement around celebrating a birthday is also another big thing that nags at me. I struggle with the idea of some people wishing a happy birthday when maybe they don’t really want to, that there is some feeling of necessity to be kinder, show more love or be more generous because someone was born on a specific day when in reality, being born doesn’t take much work from the individual. We’ve covered that I LOVE a birthday message, card or a note, top 10 favourite things without question, but I would hate to think that someone might feel like that kindness is something required of them because I happened to be born into the world on a random Monday.

Still, Even if you hate your birthday, which I wouldn’t go so far to say is my situation, although there are certainly some mixed feelings, everyone still wants to feel special on their birthday. A little bit magical, a little bit wishful, and very very very pretty!

I am learning that I always have expectations of joy even when I know I don’t enjoy being older and the connotations it brings and at the same time I’m realising that I don’t want to grow up in constant misery and contention for the age I’m approaching. Moreover, I do not want to forget all the good things of the ages before because I’m too stuck in my melancholy for an age that I cannot avoid.

So this birthday while I may be melancholic and bleak I am also going to be truly joyous in the company of those I love. Forever onwards I’m going to be using a birthday as nothing more than an excuse to spend time with those people, which is much more beneficial and fun than marinating in my arbitrary fears of aging which Poochles continues to remind me is a construct.

literally what is age but a number?

I love you all, and if you somehow have the opportunity I believe this day would be extra fabulous if we all ate some cake

xoxoxoxo

AUDS