Birthday means ...

Blogs are like a diary and journal. It records a person's development in terms of mindset, spirit and emotion changes; Reading them is somehow like reading other's stories but reminds myself who I was and am and what I have been exploring and how to improve ...


17.12.06

Once I was born, I have been embraced by a number of festivals in winter starting from the Winter Solstice – my birthday. Chinese reckon the Winter Solstice as ceremonious as Chinese New Year. Because of this my birthday is inevitably recalled by my parents and my friends who made fuzz over it sometime. What’s more, a strong sense of wintriness in the thick of winter turns this day into overwhelming warmth and joy that Christmas and New Year will bring to us. The winter Solstice dooms me to do something about it - too big day.

In our parents’ eyes, children are ‘little children’ no matter how old we are, which embarrasses me all these years. Thanks to my parents’ stay with my sister this winter, I will have a birthday day with a piece of mind at last. Except for the credit card companies’ official curtsey, piles of promotional coupons and my insurance agents’ thoughtful regard, or probably my parents and siblings wishes, no body will mention my birthday, even my son and my husband. To keep it as low key as possible, which I have been longing for ages.

I tended to take a dusty view of my birthday ever when I was a teenager. I used to believe I was disadvantaged by birth in one sense - my birthday by law is around the winter solstice but according to Chinese tradition, my age has to be added one more year just after several days of my birthday. “That’s not fair” I said to myself whenever the day came. It seemed that I was pushed to grow up while I was still daydreaming of living as free as a bird, playing hide and seek, fancying receiving lovely Barbie-like dolls every birthday …

Now birthday means I have to get older unbelievably quickly during this day no matter how unprepared I am for it or how unlikely I appear to be. It always takes time for me to digest the fact philosophically when it arrives.

I have come to the middle point of my life but it seems I have never ever to start:

I have so many books not yet read, so many topics not yet written; so many interesting things not yet tried … so many dreams not yet fulfilled. What is insight into birthday? I just realized that life is so unpredictable that I feel compelled to tell myself that if I don’t want to regret more in life - birthday means Do It Now!