SINCE it’s my birth month, let’s go down memory lane and explore how we celebrated our birthdays through different stages of life.
First birthdays often call for big celebrations and more so for firstborns. First up to, let's say, the second birthday, it’s often the mother’s birthday. It’s her party! She would argue, “The baby doesn’t even know what’s happening.” Her friends would feel it the moment they entered the party place.
That reminds me of my son’s second birthday way back in 1999. We held it at a private beach house of my Tito. I was so into the movie Message in a Bottle that I wore a Robin Wright-inspired dress for the party. I couldn’t forget my friend Gary Boy’s reaction when I greeted them at the gate, “Kinsay nag birthday?”
In the years after Terrible Two, most birthday celebrations become the celebrant’s party and no longer the mother’s. Guests are now the celebrant’s friends.
Would you agree that in our younger years, we celebrated birthdays with parties at home, or we went out and party? As a baby or a toddler, our hand holds on to a milk bottle that serves as a security blanket during parties. But as years passed, that same hand now holds a margarita or a cosmopolitan, the adult security blanket.
I can still recall my 10th birthday since it was the last time I wore all pink, from head to toe. I was like a walking Sanrio advertisement. I was not even in pink on my 18th, but I was not also in black as I'm accustomed to now.
My relatives have a favorite memory of my birthday. Oh, how they love to talk about it and laugh. It was, I think, my 2nd or 3rd. That was when I just laid on the floor the whole time of the party, unmindful of the guests. That’s always a favorite topic during gatherings, and as they said, no one in the family has surpassed it to this day.
When one is already working, birthdays at the office are also fun. You get to be young again with all the decors, the singing, the gifts, and more.
Officemates take time off their busy schedules to decorate your work area. Either they decorate it with the things you like or things you don't like, to tease you and to make it more fun for them.
That's not the only surprise. You also get serenaded, or more like, startled by your officemates’ rendition of a birthday song. Sometimes, this makes you fall off your chair sa kakurat.
How we celebrate our birthdays changes through adulthood. It becomes more profound. We choose milestone years like the 40th, 50th, 60th, etc. We become more grateful for the robust health and another trip around the sun. Celebrations become more intimate.
Now, let’s shift to you. What’s your favorite birthday memory? How do you celebrate it then and now?
