Years ago I interviewed a local author I know named Geoff Nicholl’s about his book The Birthday Scrolls. In his memoir he recalls yearly birthdays, starting with his 21st. It was a great concept and an interesting read, particularly if you live in Newcastle like Geoff does.
Imitation is the highest form of flattery, and this Monday night as I sit down in front of my laptop munching incredible Brazilian birthday carrot cake my partner made for me, I’m jotting down birthday memories that flicker in my head like the flames on little candles.
Birthdays got strange once I moved to Australia because the summer birthdays I always knew and loved became winter birthdays, which never felt the same. I try to go back to America for my birthday. Last year I turned 36 in New Orleans and actually partied in the swampy heat with some wild bartenders and lots of random strangers and I loved it. I loved it so, so much.
The year before I turned 35 on my Aunt’s sunny patio in Atlanta, sipping creamy coffee from her delicate coffee cups, feeling gratitude that I was even able to come home after two years trapped in Australia during Covid.
I should start taking better notes. Birthdays often seem like a happy blur. Always people being kind to me, feeling like people remember my birthday when I didn’t remember theirs. (This is a reoccurring theme.)
I remember the moments more than the place or even year. Phone calls, shopping trips to Designer Consigner with my Aunt. One year she used her frequent flier miles to send me to Italy. That was the greatest gift of my life, actually. I loved every seductive second of the ten perfect, chaotic days, gallivanting from Florence to Rome to Venice to Bologna to the seaside with my friends Cristina and Andrea. They looked after me the entire time. God, people are so kind. So many people repeatedly make me feel adored and loved on my birthday. Folks have sent me flowers. So many people have baked or bought me cake including my friend Clare who today split the nicest banana cake ever with me on our lunch break. Clare, forgive this photo, please. Lol. It’s special to me and I want to remember it. (Clare if you want me to take this down, I will.)
Or my friend Malvika who picked me a phallic-shaped carrot from the farmers market yesterday and hid it in a paper bag at the Maitland train station for my late arrival today.
My friend Jim who makes sure for my birthday or really any lovely occasion I have nice wine. Or my friend and colleague Paul who, every year a work made sure I had the most decadent over-the-top cake from the sadly now-closed Sweet Poison shop. I am a gal who likes cake, and they give me cake, cake, cake. People send me messages, they tag me in their Instagram stories, My Aunt DeeDee sends me cool, comfortable pants. I feel grateful for every gesture. It’s never expected and I cannot promise to return the favor or even remember yours, but I love the moments when we are kind to each other.
But also, last week I wrote about how I flinch a little bit when I think about the last time I saw my uncle. It was for my 22nd birthday, and I worry he thought I only wanted to see him because I wanted money.
When I dig, I remember the terrible birthday moments too. (Oh how humans ruminate on the bad.)
My 21st, a huge deal in the US, I forwent officially buying my first legal drink with friends out because I got lambasted by some ungodly flu. I whimpered, all alone in my grandmother’s house, so ill I couldn’t move, weak and feverish on this sticky green plastic couch in the TV room. Billy Idol’s greatest hits played on my cd player all night long while I contemplated how (especially in America) your 21st birthday is supposed to be a huge moment in life and instead I felt like I was dying. I don’t listen to Billy Idol much since then.
My 27th was unquestionably the worst. I had migrated to Australia. Despite the cold, I wore a little red dress to the Terrace Bar in Newcastle where kind people were there to celebrate. A friend who worked at a muffin shop brought piles of muffins for everyone. It was great at first, until it ended dramatically when, while we were walking home, I told my then boyfriend that I didn’t love him anymore. This made him very upset and angry (understandably) and the next day I wrote to him that I was sorry and I was wrong and I loved him and things would get better. Sadly they did not.
Then again on my 28th, newly single-ish (sort of but, also not really) I brought all my girlfriends out to go dancing. We had a plan to bar hop and finish at a club that I’m sure even then I was too old for. Somehow, this mission got delayed and people were looking for an escape. I remember sitting around a table in a boring restaurant as my friends talked about doing anything but going dancing. People wanted to sip cocktails responsibly and other boring things.
But not my friend Beth! She put her foot down in the name of birthday rank and also because she loves a good time as much as me.
”It’s Alex’s birthday,” she announced to the fading ladies, “and Alex wants to dance!” The troops were rallied (although I think we lost a few by midnight.) But Beth and I danced and danced all night long. My fear of being too old to dance were momentarily alleviated.
Maybe that was the best birthday of my life. Dancing is the best, and I wish I did it more. I wish all people did it more.
They’re all good, even the bad birthdays. I don’t like getting older, but I know it’s better than the alternative.
So thank you to Geoff for your book, and also thank you to existence for keeping me here for another joy ride around the sun. Life is good, and I’m lucky to be living, breathing and eating cake.
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Here’s what I’m learning about this week.
I’m doing some research about artists in an upcoming exhibition and these two videos really moved me.
Ben Quilty’s advice to his 12-year-old self
Leila Jeffreys’ “The Wound is the Place Where the Light Enters”
This Atlantic podcast about too much mental health speak in our everyday lives was fascinating, especially when they get into the ways that once a person finds out they have a mental illness, that knowledge also affects how everyone behave.
Beautiful article, as always. Happiest of birthdays to you x