Why birthdays make me cagey
It's not the age. It's the obligation. To want a thing. To name the thing. To receive the thing and feel the correct amount about it, on cue, in front of the people who got it for you.
It is not the age. The age, by now, is not interesting. The age is a small, dignified number that I do not, particularly, mind.
It is the obligation. The obligation to want a thing — a meal, a gift, a small ceremony — and to name the thing in advance, in the right tone, so that the people who love me have something to actually do.
It is the further obligation to receive the thing, on the day, in front of the people who got it for you, and to feel the correct amount about it, audibly, on cue.
I am bad at all three steps. I have always been bad at all three steps. I have, over the years, refined a small, polite version of cagey that gets me through the day with my dignity intact and the people who love me, mostly, unbruised.
It is a small failure of generosity on my part. They are trying to love me, on the day, in the language that is most legible to them — a meal, a gift, a small ceremony — and the least I can do is be a good audience for the love.
↳ I am working on it. it is slow.Got a theory three?
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