Today is my birthday. I have no plans for today other than maybe watching an episode of Jujutsu Kaisen. I might go grocery shopping and pick up a cake, but I might do that a different day [I did that yesterday, so I could keep tonight clear in case my Thursday D&D game actually happens] since I’m planning to gather with some friends this weekend and will probably need to go at a better time of day for grocery shopping than seven or eight in the evening. Sure, there’s fewer people present and I can usually move through the store more quickly, but the selection is also worse. Most of the restocking happens overnight, so I usually need to get in during the morning or early afternoon if I want to avoid being greeted by an empty shelf instead of one or more of the items I want. Other than that, I have no plans. It’s a Thursday, after all, and it’s not like I’m taking time off of work. Next week is already going to be a lower income week as it is, thanks to the holiday and my unwillingness to force myself to work the longer days I’d need to make up for it (I can do ten hour days with too much of a problem, but if I go over that more than a couple minutes, it immediately throws me off and I start to rapidly get exhausted and burned out). My financial position isn’t super dire or anything, but it’s kinda dire what with my federal loan payments returning in October. That’s another pile of cash that’ll just vanish down the deep, dark hole that is debt repayment every month. Too bad my parents outright lied to me about student loans and how paying them off would go back when I was still naive enough to believe them.

I’m really not sure what I expect from myself this year. Last year was a reflection about the arrival of my golden birthday (when your age matches up with the day of the month you were born, so 31 in my case) and how much it meant absolutely nothing to me when it finally arrived after an entire childhood of being excited at the idea of it. I don’t even remember what I’ve written about birthdays past that. I don’t really feel much of anything about my birthday this year, if I’m being honest, which is kind of a big change. I spent most of my life disliking my birthday because of the attention it got me from my family (which was rarely positive or healthy and almost never both). In my college years, when I finally started wanting attention because I discovered it didn’t always lead to suffering, I had people around me to help celebrate and the “always down for a party or fun event” atmosphere meant I could always get something together. After that, though, I started feeling fairly bittersweet about it because I still wanted attention, but I stopped expecting to ever really get it from anyone. Now, today, as I write this post a week ahead of time, edit it the day before it goes up, and reread it the day it’s finally up, I don’t want much of anything. I have no strong feelings one way or another.

I feel like that’s progress, if only because of the bitterness I used to associate with it is gone. I don’t want anything from my parents or extended biological family anymore. I don’t particularly care about them or what they think, so I feel pretty detached from all of my memories of horrible birthdays past (in a “I’ve processed this” way rather than the usual “I’ve compartmentalized this to distant myself from negative feeligns” way). I’ve finally confronted my parents, made some important hoices about my future, and spent enough time with all of this that it has sunk from “thinking” to “feeling.” An unfortunate side effect of all of this is that I’ve perhaps stopped seeing my birthday as significant. I mean, sure, I want to spend time with my friends, have a nice meal, and reflax in front of a fire, but I’ve wanted that all summer. I’m just using this period of time near a holiday and my birthday as the reason to ask for it (which is also progress of its own, given that I just up and asked my friends if they wanted to do something rather than approach the idea from the side in such a way that it felt less like I was asking for something and more like I was just having a conversation about things that it would be fun for us to do). Maybe I just don’t really expect anyone to mark my birthday as significant, either, and that’s why I feel content to ignore it’s passage beyond this blog post.

I mean, I’ll enjoy almost any messages I get (I will probably feel annoyed if my parents or extended biological family reach out, though). I’m certain my siblings will probably give me something to mark the occasion [my sister’s present arrived two days ago and the mug and cup were perfect gifts]. I’ll share some cake with my friends when we hang out in a few days. It’ll be nice to talk to people and know that they’re thinking of me. That’s just always true, though. I always enjoy hearing from my friends, bringing people I care about things to eat, and getting gifts. I just don’t really have any strong feelings about my birthday anymore. I feel like that should be sad, somehow. That I should be sad about this, but it’s difficult to drum up the emotion. It’s just a day. Sure, it’s when my legal age increments, but I’m just a day older than I was twenty-four hours prior. It is a tiny blip in a year and afforded so much importance that I just don’t feel it deserves. If I wound up going the entire day without even remembering it was my birthday, I wouldn’t feel disappointed. I mean, I’ve done that exact thing before and I still think of that year as one of the better August thirty-firsts that I’ve experienced.

I was a freshman in college during our first full week of classes and I was just so busy making friends that I didn’t even remember it was my birthday until late in the evening, as I was going to bed. I didn’t do anything to celebrate it. I might have mentioned it to some friends afterwards, but there was already so much going on that I didn’t really feel the need to make something happen for it. I think some of my new friends did something, but I genuinely don’t remember what and I probably discouraged it. We had enough stuff going on as it was and I didn’t have space for more events.

In my mind, birthdays are for other people to celebrate you. I always try to hype up my friends and do what I can to make sure they know I enjoy the fact that they’re in my life whenever their birthdays come around. I just also try to do that in less extravangant ways the rest of the year as well. My friends show me they love me in enough ways that I don’t really feel like I need something extravagant on my birthday. I wouldn’t say no if someone tried to make a big deal about it and I would probably enjoy it, I just don’t feel like I need it.

I honestly don’t really know what to make of all this. I’m still working through these thoughts as I’m writing them down, so maybe I’ll have a very different view when I finally edit this piece the day before it goes up [I don’t]. I mean, I’m pretty exhausted as I’m writing this, thanks to staying up way too late playing Baldur’s Gate 3 every night, so maybe this mingled sense of apathy and peace is just a reflection of the fact that I keep almost dozing off while standing at my desk. Maybe I will care about this once I’ve gotten some sleep and the day has passed without fanfare. Maybe I won’t and it’ll just be another thursday. It’s not like the date has significance for a few more years, yet, and it will only have significance then because it will be the expiration date for my driver’s license. Other than that, it feels like just another day.