Birthday

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Happy 23rd Birthday to me. As you probably can tell, the excitement… is lacking. Status at the moment? Not sure how to feel or what to say.

If I really must decide, I would say it feels… weird. It’s weird because as much as I want to feel happy and positive about things, times are hard right now; just in case you didn’t know, I have exams in a few days (did I mention I’m in medical school?). I’m sitting at my desk trying to avoid eye contact with that open Dermatology book I’ve been putting off the whole day.

For now, I’m treating this as my little getaway from reality and a little gift to myself.

Do you remember the birthdays in your first few years of life? Me, neither. I remember I used to get my birth date (8th July) wrong- can’t remember if 8 came first or 7. Birthday, it was like a ritual- every year on a particular day, people gathered and brought you cakes and presents. ‘This is niiice, ' you thought to yourself.

Years later, you kinda get the idea, you sorta dig it too- must have been all the presents! On the same day every year, others got together and celebrated YOU; your mere existence was worth celebrating. Oh and the parties! There were always so many people at the party! Who are these wonderful people who has taken their time out to honor the day you were born?

Fast forward a few years, it wasn’t just about the presents. You start remembering the faces at the party. There definitely were a few constants (you know who you are). Birthdays became the excuse for you to spend time with friends, to come up with wacky ideas of what could be fun to do on that special day. It was pretty miraculous in the sense that I come from a very small town and went on to an even smaller town to study. It was such a challenge to plan an event without it being vaguely similar to the year before (credits to my incredibly unpredictable friends and their beautifully brilliant minds).

Fast forward another few years and you think to yourself ‘Gosh, where has the time gone?’ Yesterday I was 17, today I’m celebrating my 23rd.

In your 20s, birthdays become the time for you to- warning: cheesy word ahead- reflect.

You realize it’s no longer about the presents, nor is it about what you do on the day. It really is and always has been about the people, who made that day so special for you that you’d look forward to it every year. And for that, I am very, very grateful.

You also realize that as every year that you age up, your family does too. ‘The 20s is when you will begin to really humanize your parents’ was a quote from a commencement speech I watched the other day that really hit me hard. The more I think about it, the more frustrated I become. I am very much a family person. I really want to do my parents proud and at the same time, spend more time with them. My frustration stems from the fact that I’m not doing either well and it really is breaking my heart. This is still something I’m trying to figure out. *long sigh*

Anyway, personally, birthdays were always kinda like Disneyland; it’s always such a magical time. And I really hope that it stays that way; that it continues to inspire me and that it continues to be MY special day when I can choose to escape into a world filled with my loved ones and be able to trust that the promise ‘everything will be okay’ holds every ounce of truth in the universe.