"Happy birthday to me!"
Today I turned 44 on the 4th. That won't happen again until let's see ... ever! The number 4 has always been lucky for me. When I was 34 I got pregnant. When I was 24 I moved to Maryland and got a job with Baltimore County. On my 40th b-day I bought myself a timeshare in Florida. This was the first time since that birthday that I treated myself to a weekend away. Florida was simply awesome. The weather was perfect - I got to spend quality time with dear old friends and their new babies. I played games, rocked babies to sleep, got some sun, had a close encounter with a Florida alligator, drank adult beverages and ate yummy food for 5 days. Then Monday came and reality hit like the bowl of cold water you saw Cody dunking his face in on Saturday's post.
I want to be able to say that this was the best birthday ever but it really won't hit even the top 40. Do birthdays that fall in the middle of the week ever hit the top anything? I mean really ... I wasn't expecting much but the fact that the two most important men in my life didn't do anything to make today feel special kind of hurt. Scratch that - it really hurt. Cody didn't learn his mistake from last year's birthday ... I picked him up from White Tiger and he started to give me a hand-made card and my heart filled with joy ... just in time for it to break when he said someone else made it and he didn't even sign it.
I got a Happy Birthday! text message from Kurt at six something this morning but that had as much emotion in it as the facebook messages I got from high school acquaintances. Lj was the first call I got and his country rendition of Happy Birthday frightened me awake with waves of laughter - then Franny was right behind him with her birthday serenade. All of this made Kurt's text seem even more trite. I didn't respond. Let me see what the day holds, I thought. Surely he will send an email, some flowers, something personal. I knew I wouldn't see him today - we just spent 5 days together. He was a trooper with his back pain and I knew he needed time to recover. But I really expected more than a 2 word text message....nothing all day...minutes after I asked Katie if I should be hurt about the two word birthday communication, he started texting. I found out he had dinner with his kids. I felt bad again. I had to buy myself a birthday pizza at 9:45 at night. And what really started to bug me is when I had to explain to my sister that the trip to Florida was mostly on my dime. Kurt didn't plan it - it wasn't a "let me whisk you away" kind of gig. It was a present to myself that I wanted Kurt to be a part of. I paid for the tickets down - he paid for the tickets back. I paid for the condo - he paid for the rental car. I paid for the groceries for the 5 days - he paid for dinner one night. I'm not a tit for tat kind of person but the scale is feeling really out of whack right about now. Especially when I think back to what I planned for his birthday.
Then when I saw the clock strike 11:20 and I realized he never even picked up the phone to call me on my birthday - that's when the anger hit and tears fell. I heard from Cristina and Louie and Lili. I heard from Denise, Maddie and Zach. I heard from Dad. I heard from Mom and Grams. Not a word from the man who says he loves me. At 11:57 I called him. He was oblivious to any of it, but quite apologetic when he started putting the pieces together. I've learned that explaining why I am hurt is much more productive than hoping he will guess why I'm upset. At 11:58 he told me to hang up so he could hurry up and call me on my birthday. It was cute. And took the edge off a bit. But the damage is sort of done and I'm not sure this will just go away. I worked really hard at making his birthday feel like a celebration - he worked hard at making the trip to Florida and didn't have it in him to make today feel like anything other than a regular Tuesday. I wanted the trip to be enough. But I have to be honest and say that it wasn't. Maybe this is my issue - maybe I just always expect too much from people.
But enough about that - let's end on a good birthday note. My dear friends at school showered me with treats as you can see from the picture....Gabrielle McGuire, one of my brand new AVID 9 students brought me a beautiful card and this amazing journal, my facebook wall has pages of birthday wishes and one of them made me laugh out-loud really hard - right through my hurt feelings. James Ashby wins the best birthday wish prize. He was in my Spanish class about 17 years ago. I called him "Jaime" and he will always be one of my favorites. Well today his message said: Happy Birthday! In your honor I'm gonna throw a PINATA PARTY at work ... NOW THAT IS FUNNY TO ME! I used to throw the best pinata parties EVER and it just cracked me up that after 17 some years that is what I am remembered for! Makes me want to bust open a pinata tomorrow in Jaime's honor. Let's see ... just how can I connect a pinata to AVID curriculum????
My post on facebook says what I want to fall asleep thinking: I've decided that birthdays are way more fun with Facebook! Thanks to all my family and friends from near and far, from high school and college, from RHS and NTHS. Reading all your b-day messages was a stroll down memory lane - I feel blessed beyond measure. ♥
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