Declare a Birth Month
Time to talk about BIG birthdays (since I just had one). It was relatively painless and I take all the credit. As the youngest of most of my friends, everyone was just a little too happy to wish me a happy birthday this time. All of a sudden I started getting cards that said things like ‘welcome to the other side.’ Jeez. Were they kidding? Nothing sounded gloomier, more like ‘the dark side’ than I’d even imagined. So I decided to take matters into my own creative hands and develop a method for dealing with this milestone that would make me happy and piss everyone off. I would celebrate like crazy. I would prolong the birthday and enjoy it as if I was turning twenty-one and not—oh, I almost told you the number—forget it. Not only am I not that stupid, I also edit.
Anyway, instead of a birth-day, I declared a birth-month. We all know people from various parts of our lives; social friends, sports buddies, co-workers, old friends. So what I did was remind everyone that it was my big birthday and when they asked what I was doing I replied ‘nothing much.’ When it’s your BIG birthday people immediately step up (either because they are so glad it’s not THEIR big birthday or because they know that they can certainly handle taking you out for a meal) and that’s exactly what they want to do, take you out. So I let them. I booked lots of lunches and dinners with all the different groups. Forget having a big party. It’s over in one night and then what do you do? I just did the final count and my birthday celebration came in at 7 lunches and 4 dinners. How are you going to beat that?
Then, in another stroke of genius, I told my husband not to get me a big present. I told him I wanted to go away with him. Are you getting the idea here? Depending on when and where you go you can really extend the celebration. My birthday was in the second half of February and our weekend away isn’t until later this month. This was brilliant planning on my part. Plus, do you really think that when we’re away in antique and jewelry country he’d begrudge me a little present? Here’s another good thing about doing it my way. All those people who take you out to eat, who may barely remember to call on your other birthdays, feel obligated to hand you something on your BIG one, so they bring trinkets! I’m not talking major jewelry or a fabulous bag but still. Who couldn’t enjoy a gift certificate for a massage, a cookbook, or a new bottle of Chanel?
So here are my thoughts on turning…ahem. A BIG birthday is one that really sucks, the one you spend alone, or in a hospital bed, or with a troubled child, or broke. That’s the one you have to be afraid of, not the one that is divisible by five. If you’re not in any of those dire situations, believe me, you are having a very nice, and very minor, little day.