Yesterday was my birthday. For weeks I’d had a feeling of despondency and sadness. It perplexed me because what did I have to feel sad about? Or maybe a more correct way to put it was: what did I have to feel sad about that had just happened in the previous few weeks? Nothing.
But the approaching birthday tugged on my sense of what I want in life and it felt bad. This wasn’t even a milestone birthday, so what the hell was going on?
Yesterday a friend gently reminded me that the pandemic has made everyone’s lives worse (with only a few exceptions) and caused widespread depression and anxiety like we’ve never seen. It’s across the country and across the world, across generations and across class. It’s no surprise that I feel bad.
Another friend nailed down the point: lots of people are having terrible birthdays this year.
For a few minutes of an otherwise a nice evening, I wept like a Magdelene during my celebration last night. I remembered all the areas of my life that feel like failures (relationships, business, money, weight, health, self-esteem, general contentment in life) and I broke down. A friend held me for a minute while others waited for the wave of emotion to pass. When the most intense of it was past and I had rubbed a kleenex over my face, someone told me this wasn’t the first birthday party she’d seen lately where the guest of honor felt like crap.
Hearing that helped. It reminded me that most of us have spent the past 16 months spinning our wheels while our careers, love lives, (for some, their wedding plans), and life goals have gone nowhere. Many, many of us are disappointed by where we are right now. And maybe it’s particularly bad in the U.S. where our individualism makes us hold ourselves individually accountable even for things that are caused by circumstances much bigger than we are. I feel like I have no one to blame but myself when there’s actually a goddamn global crisis that might have had a little to do with it.
How about you? Have you had a shitty birthday in the past several months? Have you witnessed one? If so, were you able to put it in the context of the pandemic or did you feel like you’d personally let yourself down?
On this day after my 55th birthday, I had a good talk with another friend who reminded me to take it easy on myself. So now I’m trying to hold on to the idea that it might feel like I’ve blown it, but a big part of my problem is a global one. That will eventually pass (eventually), so maybe the best place to put my focus is on patience, putting one foot in front of the other, and not letting discouragement overwhelm me.
It’s really the same old advice I’ve heard people recommend my entire life. I just have another chance to learn the lesson during some of the worst circumstances I’ll ever live through (I better goddamn be dead before the next pandemic hits).
I like the pink candles in the photo 🙂
Thanks. Those were from my cake. I wanted to take a photo that invoked “birthday” but not “happy.” I could have been an artist (kidding!).