Birthday Reflections: Why I Celebrate

As if the New Year didn’t already lend itself to a ritual of new beginnings and (attempted) life-altering resolutions, I have the pleasure of being doubly afflicted by a January 2nd birthday. When you turn another year older, you expect to be another year wiser, another year nobler, another year kinder. We set goals for ourselves for the next one, five or ten years of our lives to accomplish this, that, and the other thing.

But then again, maybe we don’t. Some people think of birthdays as just another day. As moms, birthdays can fall into a variety of categories: a chance to best ourselves or others, a Pinterest-worthy challenge, a headache, the celebration of life, an investment, a waste of money or so many other things. We start to think of birthdays in relationship to our kids and not ourselves; for us, a birthday eventually becomes just another day, a day where we might get an awesome macaroni necklace or a brilliantly hand drawn card, but no one is planning us a superbly themed Flirty Thirty party.

Up until this year, I have always romanticized my birthday. How amazing is it that 28 years ago on this very day I came into the world? If you really take a moment to step back and think about your birthday, you’ll take it for more than the “it’s just another day” sentiment. Because YOU came into this world so many years ago on this date, YOU have also been able to create another life who will create an impact on others’ lives just as you have.

And as I previously stated, it was up until this year I have always romanticized my birthday, but this year, only my second birthday since becoming a mom, I actually thought about my daughter and what I would want to teach her on her coming birthdays. I didn’t think about my birthday as “just another day.” I thought about it as I always do, a celebration of my life and all things good, which really boils down to her existence. As Mark Twain once said, “The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”  I was born on January 2, 1987, and on May 7, 2013, I found out why.

While we are here in this lifetime, we touch one another’s lives. Whether it’s a gentle graze or a firm grip for life, we leave some kind of an impression on those that we come into contact with. And more than anything, I want my daughter to grow up knowing that while birthday presents are fine and dandy, her birthday is an opportunity to touch someone’s life in (hopefully) a very compassionate manner.

I can’t say for certain that we’ll do away with parties and presents altogether, but I will make it my goal for this new year and years to come, this birthday, to show her just how much of an impact her birthday has made in my life and the lives of others, even those that she hasn’t yet met.

As for me and my birthday, I’ll raise my glass in celebration of my life, her life, and finally knowing the reason I was born – it’s never too late to make a difference in lives of others.