Sunday #4: 28 Years Old

On October 13th of every year my boyfriend celebrates his birthday. This year October 13th happened to fall on a Sunday, and he turned 28. We are also now living together. What that means that I got to plan something, because his birthday was happening in the home we both share.

I am a planner. I think I always have been, but those of us who know a bit about human psychology also know that sometimes what we think we are is instead what we have become along the way in order to survive life. Truth is that I don't really care why I was born a planner, or why I became one, because being a planner has benefited me in more ways than it has hurt. And on the 28th birthday of my boyfriend, my planning was, as expected, without error.

He did not want to celebrate the day (which was of little importance, as there was a birthday in the house that required acknowledgement and that was that!). One has to be careful around people who claim to not want any attention on their birthday, because they could really mean it, but they usually don't. When they actually do mean it, it often has to do with not feeling worthy for some reason, and this is why the response to this is critical--you don't want to validate negative beliefs by not doing anything, but you also don't want to trigger guilt by doing something they feel unworthy of receiving.

See how complicated all this can be?

My boyfriend did not want to celebrate the day because, at 28, he was questioning his level of accomplishment thus far and comparing it to where he thought he should be and hoped he might be. As someone who has thirty more years of life on him, I know that this is not an unusual state for someone his age, but I also know that as life goes on, it matters less where we are, and more who we are. At least that is how it is with me.

So what did I do or not do? Well, I always err toward doing something because I know that the majority of birthday complainers want the shit celebrated out of it, whether they say this out loud or not (including me). So I bought the him a couple of presents that I am sure he loves. (I am sure of this because I know him, and I know what makes him happy.) Making him happy makes me happy. This is not co-dependence, this is love. I also did not force a celebration on him, I merely invited him to join me in celebrating his day. You could say that I "modeled" celebration for him in a way that presented a challenge to his thinking.

I helped him to throw a party for his friends, but the whole time he was concerned that nobody would show up.

Worthlessness is such a troublemaker, isn't it? This is mostly because it drags along so many other painful feelings when it appears. It is tied to the premise that our value as humans is dependent on something we are or something we do, which is a total fucking lie--our worth as humans is tied to only one thing: being a human. We don't have to do or achieve anything in order to have value.

Notice I don't say deserve value. The concept of deserving something is another slippery slope waiting for us all to fall down. (To read more about what I think of deserving something, go HERE.)

***
So I made my boyfriend a cake (chocolate with cream cheese filling if you must know), and this was presented on the weekend following his birthday when his buddies were available to gather for a "kiki" at our place. A kiki is a party, one where you generally chill and gossip, but that also invites and celebrates nonconformity in gender, sexual orientation, and race. Our kiki was to include dancing, and the playlist was mostly made up of Eurovision songs--my boyfriend's favorite style of music. It is not my favorite style of music, truth be told, but I appreciate his appreciation because it tells me about his life and where he finds inspiration. That is a polite way to say that I put up with it because I love him.

The party was a blast, as gatherings of friends often are, and I watched him being celebrated while I baked off a number of pizzas for everyone to eat--nothing makes me happier than feeding people! Joy can be so simple to feel, if we allow it to be. It is different than "happiness", which frankly I don't know how to describe. But joy, now that I can tell you about. Joy is the feeling of being alive, needed, and loved. Boom.

Some might say that is what happiness feels like too, but I am wary of happiness in general because it often describes a "state of being" rather than a feeling. In other words, people are said to either be happy or unhappy. Are those the only options? With joy, you might feel it at one point and then turn around and feel sad about something, or you might feel both joy and sadness at the same time. Emotions are our response to what is happening around us, not a static state; they are something to feel and certainly not something to achieve. The thing about happiness is that we are told that it is supposed to last once we get it, but it always fails us in the end because it cannot last, and this is why I see it as a marketing tool. If you don't have it, you better get it, and here is a product that will give it to you!

It is similar to how the Catholic church uses "forgiveness" as a tool to get parishioners into church. Forgiveness must be given, you cannot declare yourself forgiven. The church co-opted a personal process for its own advancement and to ensure its survival, and yes, to help market itself to the public. ("Come get your forgiveness today!") Remember that the church also conveniently invented "sin" so that there were behaviors that needed to be forgiven.

Well I say bullshit to all that.

At the party, we ate all the pizzas, except for a couple of pieces of the grilled veggie one, and we ate about a quarter of the cake. I made way too big a cake. But now we have cake to eat for the next few weeks whenever we are feeling in need of a sweet fix. Yay!

My boyfriend still thinks he is behind the curve at 28, but I think he is right where he needs to be.

***
I am looking forward to the next weekend where I do not have to plan an event. As much as I enjoy planning, I also enjoy not planning. I plan to not plan. Not having to plan, or not planning to plan, is a luxury I did not get to enjoy until recently, and for that reason, whenever it happens now, I intend to enjoy the fuck out of it.

The world feels like a mess these days, and in many ways it is a mess. But sometimes, mostly on Sundays, it can help to generate a bit of joy in yourself and in others. This is not an act of ignoring the mess--it is a response to the mess. And if all it takes is some chocolate cake, some pizza, and a playlist of Eurovision, then so be it. Now, more than ever, it is useful and valuable to celebrate being alive.

Happy 28th Birthday my love.