HBD

My birthday is Sept. 5th, so growing up as a kid my birthday was very often on FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!

Now, I don’t flatter myself to be in the same category as those born on say, Christmas Day, or New Year’s Eve, but as a six-, seven- or eight-year reciting first day of school introductions with, “My name is Grace and today is my birthday!” is like saying as an adult on the first day of your new job, “Hi, my name is Grace and today is my birthday!”

Right??

Patricia’s birthday is ALSO on a holiday - now, if you have to have a birthday on a holiday this is the one to have it on because everyone always wants to go out and party - hello St. Patrick’s Day! And as kids it fell on March break – your birthday AND March break all in on week? Props Patricia, props.

Also, full marks to my Mum who - being who she is - always remembered to put a birthday card in my lunch-box so I would have a nice surprise when I opened it. When I got to high school however, harder to do because we ate lunch out of the vending machine…

But by then we had a great group of friends, and they always managed to use the end of summer as an excuse to mark the occasion - be it a movies expedition (where Patricia broke her ankle), a surprise party in my friend Kate’s basement, fireworks in the park (even the cops came to that one!) or a trip to the casino (18th birthday of course…)

And over time I stopped seeing it as, “My birthday is on the first day of school :( ” and saw it as, “The first day of school is my birthday :) ”

I once had an ex-boyfriend say to me, "People respond the way they’re approached,” which I have seen proven over and over to be true. And I think it can apply to situations too, especially ones we have no control over. We can’t control the day we were born, other people’s reactions, the weather, a worldwide pandemic? But we do have some semblance of control on how we try to respond to it…

I don’t go to school anymore, I haven’t since I was twenty-seven, so my birthday hasn’t been on the first day of school in over… um, lots of years… well, not LOTS, but enough… and as we approach the challenge of school’s trying to re-open during these very difficult times, my thoughts are with all the teachers, school administrators / workers, students and parents -
this school year is not only different from the ‘90s, but from any point in history.

And I know, that out there somewhere trying to navigate all that is our complicated world, on the first day back to school there will be a five-, six-, seven- to whatever-year old’s birthday, thinking, “It’s my birthday on the first day back to school, and no one knows.”

To them I say, I do...

... and Happy Birthday!

Love, 
Grace

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