Birthday blues

Existentialism, candles and snails

My birthday is a week away, and I’ve been feeling the birthday blues creeping in slowly but steadily. Why is this even a thing? When I was a kid, my birthday was the best day of the year - I’d literally count down the days. Being a summer baby meant I was always on holidays, and so I always got to wake up to a nice surprise breakfast with balloons and sparkles. My dad once spelt happy birthday with cereals on a cake, and my mum always took the day off work. I’d have two birthday parties: one with friends, one with family. Both of them always included spending time in the garden, music, decorations, jumping in the pool, and sometimes even a hired fairy. I’d dress up and dance around, put on my bikini, play with water guns, and eat ice cream cake (yes, you read that correctly)

It’s not always like this, but these past few years my birthday has felt lonelier. Perhaps this is a particularly difficult year, but I’ve noticed the blues ever since I moved abroad three years ago. I still go back home to celebrate with my family at some point over the summer - but it’s not the same.

I know they’re sad I’m not around as much, and I’m also sad I can’t be. The friend groups I’ve celebrated my birthday with over these years are always different. Not that that’s a bad thing, I’ve moved around quite a lot. But I think it’s absence and change that saddens me. My grandparents are not around anymore. And the realization of so many people coming and leaving my life every year is something I‘m still learning to accept. My birthday feels like a confrontation with finality: the finality of life, of limited time with my loved ones, of my own mortality.

Everything, Everywhere, All At Once

Am I wasting my potential? Am I living the life I want? I couldn’t come up with a wish to blow the candles with over my family’s celebration. I don’t know what I want this year. I feel lost, hungry for direction. I’ve always had a goal, a wish, a hope. This year I’m just trying to get by and figure it out. I’m trying to be present, and decide on what I want out of life itself. I miss my best friends. I miss my dog. I love my friends in London, and it’ll be nice to celebrate with them too. But I also know I won’t be here forever - and they won’t either. I know it’ll be one of my last birthdays here too with all of them.

A year isn’t that long, but so much happens in between birthdays - especially in your twenties. In four years I’ve graduated from my undergrad, moved to Scotland, finished a master’s, found my partner, spent half a year in Malaysia, gone back to Spain, moved to London, started a PhD, quit it, started a second masters, landed my dream job, made lots of friends, lost some others, shared a house, moved in with my partner and weathered a depressive episode. I crave excitement and change and feeling like I’m moving forward; but I also need stability and community and a real plan on where I’m heading. I know I’m always trying to plan too far ahead, when in reality I can’t know what will happen. I’m not my future self yet, so I can’t make decisions for her at this moment in time. If I overthink it, do I even have a choice? Am I making decisions or simply responding to life’s currents?

I guess I miss when it all was easier. When everyone was still around. I want to transform my birthday back into a celebration again, not a mourning, not a grieving. I want to be excited I’m still here and have such wonderful people to celebrate with. I want to honor those I can’t celebrate with anymore by being happy on the day I used to cherish their company. I want to celebrate all I’ve achieved and overcome. I want to send the Universe a message of gratitude - please keep bringing love and good things my way.

I’ll be 27 soon. I thought I’d have it all figured out by now. But I only have new questions - and I may never find the answers. Do people die when they’ve figured it all out? When they have no more questions to find answers to?

Some years are years of shell and some others are years of snail. In years of shell I retreat to myself, I go inside and find some answers. I work on myself, I process things, I plant the seeds. In years of snail I go out again, I flourish, I pick up the fruits from the seeds I planted, I move forward. I’ve realized this is a year of shell. I’ll still progress in time, but not just yet. It all serves a purpose. Maybe my wish this year should be to find some answers - to hope these seeds grow into a beautiful tree. I hope the snail that comes out does so with full confidence. I hope it knows its path and moves towards it - slowly but surely.

P.S: Happy Birthday to all my fellow cancerians!! 🦀 🫧 our hearts weren’t built for this world, but remember our softness is our biggest strength!