Crappy Birthday To Me

It’s my birthday today. Big deal. I feel just like I do any other day. I am doing the same things I do everyday. I feel nothing special about today or about myself. I am not one of those people who likes to celebrate birthdays, probably for the same reasons I prefer to lie on my bed on new year’s eve while all my friends are out partying. Maybe it has something to do with the years passing, time slipping away, opportunities bungled or lost completely. What worries me especially on this day is that I may never be able to fulfill my promises, that my dreams would remain just that, and that I may never be successful at the things that matter most to me. My paranoia is fueled by the fact that I actually have had to abandon some of my dreams as the years passed by. And no matter how much I accomplish or where I am in life, when my birthday approaches, I feel the same way. I feel like I didn't do enough, or loved enough, or wrote enough. I am clearly a the-glass-is-half-empty type of person. Sad, I know.

I don’t usually let people know when my birthday is. Only my immediate family knows and a few close friends. I just don’t like people making a big fuss out of it. Nevertheless, I have deliberately kept it public on my Facebook. I am doing a little experiment on human hypocritical behaviour. I love to see some of my Facebook “friends” leave a message on my wall on my birthday asking for a ‘treat’ or where the party is. Yeah sure! You haven’t been in touch with me the whole year but since you left a message, I would gladly give you a treat and invite you to the party. Pathetic. It makes me feel good about myself that I am not like that. I will not wish someone on their birthday if I haven’t kept in touch the rest of the year. That’s that. I don’t care if they feel offended.

I cringe every year as my birthday looms around the corner, knowing that it will be just like every other birthday, filled with disappointment. I realise that expectations have a huge part to play in my hatred for birthdays, and maybe a tad bit of loneliness. However, I genuinely enjoyed my birthday in 2009 because I had some very close friends and loved ones who made it special. But as I look back now, I can't help but regret having had a good time because it wasn't long after that that we drifted apart. I am not even in touch with some of them now. And so, I really hate birthdays. 

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t hate YOUR birthday, just mine. Neither do I detest celebrating someone else's birthday. In fact, even though I don’t exactly enjoy it, I do make it a point to remember and wish people close to me on their birthday or buy them presents if I am not broke, partly because I value my relationships and I know how much they look forward to it.  However, I just don’t like celebrating mine because I don’t feel like it is worth celebrating. I hate getting presents now, and I hate people wishing me a happy birthday. There is nothing happy about it. It kills me when someone buys me a present on my birthday. I hate it that they feel obligated to buy me something. Of course, I would love it if someone told me how glad they were that I am alive on a random day, or if someone bought me something randomly that they thought I would like. But that hardly happens now. Of course, it wasn't always this way. In my younger days, I actually looked forward to my birthday and the presents and celebration that followed. I thoroughly enjoyed my sixteenth birthday, reveled in my freedom at eighteen, got drunk at twenty-one, but now I am almost appalled at the thought of it all. It feels so suffocating now. In fact, other people seem to be far more happier about my birthday than I am. My flatmates and a few of my friends are throwing me a small party tonight. I don't blame them. They probably think I am going to love it. I really want to, but I probably wouldn't. Yet, like every year someone throws a party for me, I will pretend or at least try to love what they did for me. I really hope none of them reads this.

Crappy Birthday to me.