So let’s review: Solicited attention, good. Unsolicited attention, bad.
2 minute read
May 13, 2010, 2:19 PM
With my birthday coming up at the end of this month, the love-hate relationship I’ve had with my birthday has come up, and we’ve again discovered that the emphasis is more on “hate” in that love-hate birthday relationship. Really, I don’t look forward to it anymore, since I get a bunch of well-intended but unwanted attention. To me, it’s like, okay, it’s a number change, big deal, and so okay and let’s move on.
Really, it’s all a matter of attention. If I am seeking it, I will gladly accept it. However, if I don’t want it, even if it is positive, I will try to escape it, or deliberately ruin it. I escaped my college graduation, where, if I didn’t get my way, I would have gotten undesired attention while at the same time not enjoyed myself. And the hell with what family members want when it comes to me celebrating milestones in my life. If I want to celebrate a milestone with everyone, then great. Let’s all be happy together. If I want to celebrate in my own way, or choose not to celebrate at all, that’s my prerogative. Nothing wrong with that. And if celebration in my honor is forced on me against my will, I will make sure to spoil it. I remember in 2005, my mother was all gung-ho about my birthday, and wanted to go all out for it, and I didn’t want to have anything to do with it. If I recall, I turned the phone off and just left for a while. Then when I got back home, I threw my unwanted birthday cake in the trash right along with the unwanted birthday card. I don’t understand what makes people want to spend money to celebrate something where the person whose thing it is being celebrated doesn’t want it to be celebrated in the first place. I tell people not to buy me a card, and they don’t listen. I tell them not to buy me a cake and they don’t listen…
On that note, I did manage to get out of getting a birthday card at the office this year. I believe coming clean about what happened to last year’s card was quite beneficial. After all, I never even opened it. I threw the bloody thing away two months later, having never read it. And besides, birthday cards are cheap sentiment, and a waste of paper and money.
I don’t know… I think it’s my whole thing about attention that has ruined my birthday, likely permanently. If I can’t tell people not to make a big deal about it and have them respect it, then I don’t want to have anything to do with it. I don’t like the whole idea of everyone and their mother coming up to me and saying, “Oh, happy birthday!” I don’t appreciate it. And there’s nothing wrong with me for feeling that way. Maybe there’s something wrong with you if you can’t accept the way I feel about my birthday.
Meanwhile, I think this year, I’m going to be able to pretty successfully ignore the birthday. After all, I’m going to be in Boston with the Anons…
Web site: Someone else wants people to just ignore their birthday...
Song: Old Jews Telling Jokes: Meeting Mom
Quote: Hopefully we won't have to revisit this matter, but you know we will...
Categories: Birthdays