Twenty-Five

My birthday is my favorite holiday. I know what you’re thinking, and yes, I’m serious…I am that kid, I know. I have a love/hate relationship with attention…that is, I hate it, unless I’m at the center of it. I’m kidding- for the most part. Anyone who has known me a while knows I can be a little bit of a dichotomy in that (and every sense). Self-centeredness aside, my birthday always brings me so much joy, so, since I love writing almost as much as I love my birthday, I decided to write a blog about it.

There were many forms this blog could take. It could have been a myriad of different “25 for 25 lists”; 25 things I love, hate, am grateful for, am hopeful for, etc. But I decided against that, in part because there is a TAMU initiative that has to do with the number 25 that always made me roll my eyes as an undergraduate that I would like to stay far, far away from now. Also, lists are passé— I want something fun on my birthday.

This blog could have also been a cute, all about me blog. Sort of like those boards people hand to their kids when they go off to kindergarten; i.e. my name is Delaney, today I am 25, when I grow up I want to have a doctorate and make enough money to survive. Stuff like that. But, again, boring. You all know that about me; after all, we’re all friends here.

So, what is this blog, then, if not just the ramblings of a mad person? This blog is dedicated to the peculiarity of life, my life, in particular. I typically write about what I do; today, I write about who I am. With all the literature I have read lately, I have stopped believing both in a self separate from others and a self that is stable. Thus, this blog, like my life, is about me, which really means it is also about all of you, but only for this moment. Join me in these ramblings as we take a snapshot of the right now, March 11, 2022. But before we do so, let me tell you about all the things I could tell you about the past…

I could tell you about how, two years ago on my 23rd birthday, March 11, 2020, COVID was declared a global pandemic by the WHO. I could also tell you how that memory prompted my interpretative methods research study for the semester. I could tell you a lot more about that birthday, if you ask. There were a lot of important moments on that birthday, even without taking COVID into account.

I could tell you that last year on my 24th birthday, March 11, 2021, I received my COVID vaccine, a year after the pandemic began. I could also tell you how my master’s cohort classmates sang me happy birthday during our Zoom class that night.

I could tell you how I have a specific playlist of songs I listen to every year on my birthday. I could also tell you the memory I have of listening to it as I skateboarded in circles in a TAMU parking lot waiting for my parents to arrive on my 20th birthday on March 11, 2017.

I could tell you how on my 22nd birthday, March 11, 2019, my friends called me at midnight to play the famous Taylor Swift song, which I added to my birthday playlist for that year only. I could also tell you that I had gotten into my masters program and gotten an executive position in my undergraduate organization that same week. I could also tell you how I spent my night partying with some of my favorite people, two of whom were under the age of 6 at the time.

On my 21st birthday, March 11, 2018, I could tell you how I was alone in my dorm room during spring break. I could also tell you that I didn’t even have a drink until the next week at a Lorde concert.

I could tell you how the last time my birthday was on a Friday was on my 19th birthday on March 11, 2016. I could also tell you that this was my freshman year in college and I spent the morning sitting in the back of my physics class drawing on my laptop rather than paying attention in class and then went alone to a TAMU baseball game that night.

I could tell you that I went out to a movie on my 18th birthday and a trampoline park on my 17th birthday. I could also tell you how my math teacher bought me a gift on my 18th birthday and on my 17th birthday I had cookies with basketballs and leprechauns on them because of all the other goings ons in March.

I could tell you how my favorite birthday memory is when I was too embarrassed to admit that I wanted a birthday party (and afraid my friends wouldn’t show up if I asked) so my mom pretended to throw me a surprise party to make me more comfortable. And how I told my longest and one of my best friends of 14 years that secret just last year after keeping it from her for a decade. I could also tell you about the party when I made soap with my friends or the one where we made necklaces and talked about the infamous fifth grade puberty talk, called simply, “the talk” on the bus ride back.

I could tell you how my brother called me on my birthday and told me he was moving from Bartlesville and I can tell you the video game I was playing when he called.

I could tell you about the birthday where I painted pottery and got three coveted stuffed animals. The same birthday where I turned ten and my brother reminded me that this was the biggest digit (the tens digit) that I would probably get to in my life and how this brought mortality to the front of my mind for one of the first times in my life.

I could tell you how my favorite cake ever made was a unicorn and that I absolutely must have strawberry cake with vanilla frosting on my birthday. (The reason for this, you’ll be saddened to know, is gender roles. My mom made me strawberry cake when I was little because it was pink, but now I can’t go without it.)

I could tell you that March 11, 1997, the day I was born was a Tuesday. I could also tell you that my birthday is the reason my lucky number is eleven. I could also tell you how there is a picture of my mom going into induced labor with me that day in a dress that still hangs in her closet (and still fits, she wanted me to add). I could also tell you that she was induced to have me early because otherwise I would have been too big, which, to this day, I blame on my wide shoulders.

I could tell you how I consider my birthday my new year and get even more reflective at this time of the year than I usually am. I could tell you that I don’t think in chronological order and the memories I shared above are in the order that they came to mind. I could tell you that I have been told that I have an exceptional memory, that I had to look none of this up, and that I’ve always been this weird, from the time I was zero years old until now.

I could tell you all of those things.

But, to end out, I want to focus on the now. Twenty- five. Halfway over the proverbial hill. Right now, I am old enough to be mistaken as the mother of my friend’s six year old, but young enough to make fun of this same friend and the several others I know who are her age about how old and wise they are.

At twenty-five, I have an odd, momentary obsession with peppermint patties, baths, and candles.

Just like every year before, I spend a ridiculous amount of time picking out my clothes each day and at this point in my graduate program I am sad because I’ve run out of new clothes to wear in front of my peers and will have to start repeating outfits again. These are my concerns, at twenty-five.

My best friend is my cat and I hope she lives to be twenty-five, too.

I’m not quite sure what else to say about twenty-five which seems alright since time is an ephemeral concept anyway and I am writing this at twenty-four but you may be reading it when I’m twenty-six.

So, to myself I say, happy birthday, Delaney. I hope this next trip around the sun treats you well. I love you.