September 2, 2009
You don’t have to be a clairvoyant to know a birthday will reek of mild embarrassment. It’s a fact of life that permeates through time and space. And it usually wears a sombrero.

That feeling that comes over you when you are dining in a restaurant when, all of a sudden, the room is alive with singing, clapping, felicitations in a different language (depending on the kind of restaurant). Sympathy. That poor person, uneasily, uncomfortably in the middle of the chaos. You feel sympathy, but deep inside you’re glad it’s not you. And if you are the one in the middle of the whirlwind, well, nothing more than the ground swallowing you whole will suit the moment.

When it comes to birthdays, I think of them like I do a tempestuous thunderstorm–I would rather cover my head and wait for it to pass.