when a birthday becomes your birth day

on the gift of aging

Some like them.

Even love them.

For me — it’s complicated.

Many wait for that one day a year where they are celebrated and special, no matter what. in 1993, my birthday became my birth day. More the day I was born of my mother than a day for dinner out, balloon bouquets or candles promising health-filled wishes. Others see them as time slipping by. Away. Dedicating themselves to soaking up the 365 ahead with a newfound zest and purpose.

I think of each year, as another without my mother. Not melancholy exactly, or even bittersweet. Just my truth and the bad addition that comes of grief math.

Sure, I celebrate with family, but she never runs far from my mind.  There were the years after she passed away suddenly at 50,  that I counted how many birthdays until I got to that stunning mile marker. A very untimely finish line.

When I turned 49, it was the year of “what if this was all I had left” racing in my mind on loop. Each year post 50, felt like a gift and a sort of betrayal.  I got more. More than her. No time to waste. Here to make meaning and memories and to make her proud. To learn to make myself proud. A muscle I am still learning to flex. This has proven true for so many of the motherless daughters I sit with in my work.

The year I turned 55, I realized I was more years without her on the planet than with her. Oh, the way we jostle with time in our head and in our heart—it is so confounding. Too much time. Never enough. Right in the moment. Where has it gone? Slow it the hell down.

It really is my birth day, every day. For I am alive—alive more than she ever was.  Well, just in years, not in spirit. Her spirit had a largess, most never know. A gift in of itself. To know Ellen, was to know this. Childhood friends continue to regale me with stories of their memories of her, and it feels like a warm visit of sorts. A glorious reminder of her here.

It’s hard to recall all of the gifts she gave me. A tiny teddy bear for my charm holder with a diamond belly stands out - it lives on my daughter’s charm bracelet. There was a Spirograph one year and a tiny art desk.  I do recall all of the parties she made. She placed a cover over the basement pool table, and a plastic tablecloth atop. She scattered drug store make up and waxy face paint some years, crafting supplies and colored construction paper and pumpkins in other years. We celebrated the coming of Halloween as it mixed closely with my 10-29 birth date. 

Here is Mom and all the kids in costume. I remember this Drowsy doll and my beloved art desk. I am dressed as Casper the Friendly Ghost.

“Almost a witch," she always said. She ordered special black and orange dyed loaves of bread and made tiny triangle tea sandwiches of peanut butter and jelly and tuna salad. We ate Charles Chips, scooped from their signature brown and beige tin barrels and orange punch in Dixie cups. Carvel iced cream cakes were always a favored ask, as I was never much of a cake fan.  "Extra crunch inside, please."

Mom was all about good manners and a thank you for each gift. She’d hand me her meticulous list of gifts and who’s who, post party. Each year she took a photo of me and the friends by a tree in the back yard in costume or posing with a cleverly decorated pumpkin. When we had it developed, (yes, at the Fotomat) it was placed in a card with photo corners and served as the hand made note.  This was so very clever. A childhood friend recently found hers and sent it to me. There are gifts in the memories. Revisiting the photos of parties past, and reveling in her as a young mom.

At 50 I woke in the morning and added her signature to my lefty wrist in the form of a tattoo. The artist took my license as was the law in Chicago and noticed it was my birthday. He treated. This felt like a gift from Mom, though I think she would have been good and pissed that I tatted up when she was so against it! That evening I gathered friends and had three of my beloved yoga teachers lead us. I read everyone a piece I wrote to her and about her in a closing circle. This was the first time I had ever shared in this way. It gave me permission to continue to do so and for them to do the same. So many reached out to me when they experienced a loss, or when October rolled around and they remembered it might be hard for me.

My Mom and I share birthdays just a week apart. Scorpio sisters! Hers on November 5. She would be turning 82 this year. Each year on my birthday I buy a treat from her to me. This ritual has become a favorite of mine. On her birthday, my sister and I celebrate her Olympic grade prowess for finding an epic discount. We try to find something on sale and exchange our wins at the end of the day. I also light a Yahtzeit candle, a Jewish memorial to candle that burns for 24 hours. Having that sparkle around the house feels right. Gosh, I feel as if I should probably light one daily.

Turning 59 this year, is something she never got to do. As the year turns its leaves and October comes, I feel both lucky and also know it is a sweater clad season of grief. I get to be 59 feels like a rather incredible thing to say. There were many years I thought 50 may be as far as the ride would take me.

Thank you for being along.

It is a great adventure.