It’s my birthday, and I’ve got some feelings about it.
I’ve never not cried on my birthday.
Which is ridiculous, because I’ve never been someone who puts particularly high stakes on the day. I’m nothing if not practical, and birthdays as an adult are rarely going to be as magical as the romantic in me wishes they were.
However, even with incredibly lowered expectations, my birthday has historically been a very hard day. For the first few years of adulthood, I had a habit of befriending people who required a lot from me, and maintained those friendships by being incredibly cool and low maintenance and never needing anything from them. Surprising no one except my young self, these sorts of friends don’t magically step up and put in effort to make you feel special on big occasions. In fact, since they were in the habit of making things about them, they either left me feeling completely abandoned on my birthday, or would give me underwhelming wishes and then move on to requiring my attention on whatever was on their mind. I’ve also had an unfortunate string of bad luck with family events or emergencies lining up around my day. In both cases, those days obviously are not about me—which makes perfect sense!—but still, I begrudged the fact that as a person who so seldom asked for attention, the one day that should be all about me wasn’t being given to me.
These are usually the headlines of my birthday, but now (with my wisdom of having had so many miserable ones) I think it’s really just a normal day to be emotional about. When I was a teenager, I had huge expectations for my future self, and I’ve lived up to very few of these—understandably, because teenagers have no real idea of what the world looks like! I thought I’d have saved the world by now, I’d be married and a homeowner, I’d live overseas, I’d be a bestselling author but also a lawyer but also a game designer but also a politician or activist but also maybe an actor or director but also an artist but also— you get the point.
Shockingly, most of that wasn’t realistic for the incredibly short amount of time I believed I’d achieve things.
And while I logically know we’re all on our own paths, and it’s pointless to compare ourselves to each other, and it’s fine to disappoint your teenage self who had no idea about the world, I’m also twenty-seven, and a huge part of me feels like a failure. This is, of course, the universal experience of being twenty-seven.
Every year of my adult life, I’ve arrived at my birthday and I’ve been generally pretty proud of who I am, but still deeply disappointed in not being where I want to be. It’s a weird balance to strike. And every year, I try to adjust my expectations, try new things, set new goals, and still, I arrive at the next birthday and go through the emotional turmoil of trying to hold myself gently, while trying not to get my hopes up about having a good day, and then I think about my life and where I’ve been and what I want to do, and it all sort of comes crashing down again.
I love the idea that when we look at our lives, our early twenties are actually the baby-adult years. You’ve only just got permission to be your own person, you’re still so young and figuring things out. Nothing makes sense and you’re still pretty sure you’re a teenager, just, with a weird amount of power you didn’t have a year or two ago? And there seems to be a general understanding that once you hit your thirties, that’s when you finally start actually feeling like a grown up, if there is such a thing. It’s the young adulthood of adulthood.
So, what I’m delighted to conclude from that is that your late twenties are where you’re living your teenage-adult years. You’ve kind of figured out some sense of self, you have a little bit more independence and power, but no one expects you to be a real grown up just yet. To me, twenty seven sounds like a sweet sixteen, of sorts. And this awareness has freed me from the judgement of my real-teenager self.
The past few weeks have felt like an era of rebirth for me. I’ve been looking at some major life changes, and I’m getting underway in making them. After losing my job at the end of last year, I’ve been freelancing and have enjoyed a huge amount of flexibility to focus on some creative projects. I’ve even been making headway on those creative projects (which I’ll hopefully have some updates about soon)! On a whim, I decided it was time to go back to my natural hair colour after several years of dyeing my hair red, and it has felt strangely like a homecoming. I’ve also lost some friends I didn’t expect to lose, but I’ve gained some new ones too.
All that to say, this birthday is probably the first time in my life that the emotions I’m feeling are more positive than anything else. I was overwhelmed with how many kind and thoughtful and heartfelt messages and calls I received from my friends first thing this morning—proof that the last few years I’ve spent building boundaries and feeling lonely have paid off in finding some really meaningful friendships where I feel loved and prioritised. The plans I had with my family got completely derailed due to my own silly mistake (where I somehow got the idea that the place I wanted to go was in a town about an hour from home, when it was in fact in a different town, about an hour away in the opposite direction—something we only found out once we arrived). And instead of feeling like the universe must be out to get me, I laughed, and gladly took it as the funny story it’s going to be.
I’m not a superstitious person, but I enjoy a beautiful sky, and I believe that having one on my birthday must be a good omen. This morning, and throughout the day, the sky has been filled with these beautiful, crisp clouds. As I write this, the humidity of the day has finally broken, and thunder and lightning are rolling across the sky. I don’t think you get more clear “new start” weather than either of those, so it must be particularly special that I was given both, right?
In the grand scheme of things, I’m still just a child of the world. But I’m also entering a new chapter, and I’m embracing the messiness of being a teenager while I walk confidently through it. There will be mistakes and adventures and love and heartache and figuring out who I am and what I want. I’m going to listen to so much Fall Out Boy, and I’m going to enjoy all the phases and hyperfixations that feel true to me from day to day. And I’ll believe that I can achieve my dreams. (Maybe they’re just a little more realistic this time around?)
Happy birthday to me!
Kate Southwood 