Birthday

In twenty days, I'm going to be twenty-three. And I'm kind of... nervous... about it.

I'm not nervous about turning twenty-three or being twenty-three, I'm more nervous about my actual birthday... day.

I know that there are people who just kind of grow out of birthdays. As they get older, fewer birthdays feel important. Some people will want to do something--like go out to dinner with friends or family--but they don't really want to have a big party or make a huge to-do about it. Let me tell you upfront: I am not one of those people.

I love birthdays. Birthdays are basically my favorite things. Not just mine. I love basically anybody's birthday. Gift Giving and Quality Time are basically tied for my top love language. And a birthday is basically spending time with someone and also giving them presents. But then I especially like my own birthday because it's like I'm just surrounded by the love, man. Also? I love planning things. Activities, outfits, menus. Event planning is pretty much my favorite thing of all time. So I love my birthday.

Sometimes, I literally start vaguely planning them months in advance. Like, this year? Back in April I was thinking that I'd have a Nate The Great themed shindig. Which I know is a children's book. But it was also my favorite children's book when I was a child. Anyway. I wanted to dress up like Rosamond. I wanted to have a pancake bar--with pancakes and a variety of toppings to choose from--because Nate the Great is always eating pancakes. I wanted to have a place where people could paint, though they would be limited to yellow and red paint in honor of the mystery Nate solves in the first book. I wanted to set up a treasure hunt. Sounds fun right?

But I'm not doing that.

Why? Good question. And I'll get to that. But first let me tell you about my 7th-10th grades of schooling. I had a group of girls that I'd been friends with since elementary school. (I'm going to make up names here, but my guess is if they read this they'll know that I'm talking about them. It's no hard feelings, though. It's just an important part of my explanation.) My group of since-elementary-school friends almost never asked me to hang out. A lot of the time, they'd all hang out without me. And that hurt my feelings a lot. I mean, I'm sure that they didn't do it on purpose. And I believe that they genuinely liked me. My guess is that they just never really thought to.

To combat the problem of my social pariahship, and aggressive loneliness, I would frequently get permission to have a friend come over. Then, the worse part. I would call Lindsey who couldn't come over because she had plans with Rebecca. So I'd call Rachel who couldn't come over for one reason or another. Then I'd call Lydia who couldn't come over because she had plans with Jessica. And so on and so forth until, I'd be so sad and feel so rejected and unlovable that I just couldn't call any more people. Were you ever that person who looked around the classroom when the teacher said, "Partner up!" and saw that all of your friends had already partnered up with one another? Because I wasn't just like that in class. I was like that in social life, too. I remember one time I went to the mall with my group of friends and we were walking from one store to another and up in front of me, Lindsey and Jessica were laughing and talking, and back behind me, Lydia and Rachel were laughing and talking and I was just in the middle. Walking alone.

Side note: I did spend a lot of time hanging out with Alli and Laura (those are their real names, sorry to them if they wanted to keep their identities secret) who are absolutely always the exception when I talk about friend groups that made me feel unwanted and annoying. I feel like, when I talk about my social experiences in high school, it's important to mention them as a disclaimer. Because they honestly salvaged my sanity and I love them both so much. Okay, that's enough of that. On to my story.

What does this have to do with you not having your awesome already planned out birthday party? Excellent question. The answer is basically that I've already called Lindsey and Rebecca, Rachel, Lydia, and Jessica, and none of them want to hang out.

Whaaaaat?

Okay, so, last year I had a really rough birthday. Sometime in late June/early July my father was diagnosed with bladder cancer. He had to have surgery, which got scheduled for the day before my birthday. My mother suggested that we celebrate my birthday earlier in the week, and the family was supposed to go out to eat with my aunts and one of my cousins. However, my dad had a test a few days before and was still in a lot of pain when it came time to go out to lunch. So my parents ended up staying home and I never actually got to celebrate turning 22 with them. On the actual day of my birthday, my brother and I went to visit my dad in the hospital. We were also supposed to go out for coffee and/or pastries with my aunt and grandmother, but ultimately we didn't get to. My mom did try to take us out for coffee, but it turned out she didn't have enough cash on her, so that kind of fell through, too. Anyway, on top of that, most of my friends were out of town and I only got a few lousy texts from two of my friends who were in town saying, "Happy birthday!" at about four p.m on my birthday.

Laura, mentioned before as being one of the wonderful friendship exceptions, did go out to eat with me. Plus she brought cupcakes. It meant so much to me.

Also, my dad is all good now. He has to go in every few months to make sure he's still cancer free, and he is! So yay! That's a side note, but I think it's an important side note because I told you he was diagnosed with cancer and even if that isn't really what this blogpost is about, it might be something that you're curious about.

The point is: last year, I wanted to have a Pushing Daisies themed party and instead I spent several days driving back and forth between our house and the hospital.

In May I graduated from college. After four years of hard work, I finally earned that degree. Pretty cool, right? I didn't go to the graduation ceremony, but I did use it as an opportunity to finally have that Pushing Daisies party. We had pies and decorated the house with daisies. A ton of my extended family came, and I love hanging out with my extended family. And I had a really nice time. Really, I did. It meant so much to me that they came... but: none of the friends that I invited showed up.

And I know that a lot of them have very valid excuses for that. And part of it is definitely my fault. I wanted to keep it small so I only invited a handful of people in the first place. But not one of them showed up. After the time that the invitation said the party was ending passed, most of my family members went for a walk. And I stayed at home because I felt like surely one of my friends will be coming. But none of them did.

So that's why I don't want to have a birthday this year. I wish I could just skip over the day. I don't know that I trust my friends to show up. And I'm really not okay with getting hurt about it all over again.