Happy Birthday to me! I was born in February, and unbeknownst to me when I was a child bringing cupcakes into grade school to celebrate my special day, it is a month everyone hates. Not only does it harbor an anxiety-fostering holiday for women (a-hem Valentine’s Day), have an inconsistent number of days (a-hem Leap Year), but it also is always bitterly cold (a-hem Winter.)
Despite the angst and absurdity during this time, whether it is bitter females creating anti-Valentine’s Day campaigns or 16-years-old celebrating their fourth birthday February 29th, I still try to enjoy my big day.
This year I am turning the ripe, yet mature, age of 24. With every year past the age of 21, I feel like I am being forced to say goodbye to my youth. Even four seasons closer to the age of 30 is too much to bear as an early twenty-something.
When I hear the word “thirty,” I immediately think of… “marriage + babies = no more Adrianna time.” Okay, okay, I realize this is not on everyone’s plate, because it seems today many are settling down much later than 30. It could be that there is post graduate school, which creates additional time constraints and financial burdens that can complicate domestic bliss. Others may just want to focus on careers, delaying their searching for a significant other. Still, some might just want to “hang out” a little longer before tying the knot.
I know having a plan is so old-fashioned of me, but I do want to be married by the time I am 30. So with each year that passes, I know I am heading more away from $3 frozen margaritas after work with old college friends to looking forward to rushing home when I clock out to cook my new hubby a good dinner. Although I am used to being pampered by my family and realize that if I have a baby, I won’t be the baby anymore, I will welcome having my own baby when it is actually time to do so. But, for now I have to make sure to enjoy every Happy Hour special that New York and Hoboken has to offer.
Now that I have accepted the crappy month in which I was born (although my parents always said I was the sunshine who dawned in their winter), along with the fact that I will soon be showing my kids how cool their mom used to be (of course, I will play it up more than I actually was) – it is time to party! But where to go?
I spent the past year making Atlantic City trips, exploring the Big Apple’s night life, and doing the local Hoboken route for my friends’ birthdays. You put so much into the entire year making sure to do the best friends routine for their birthdays: get them excited before their big day with texts leading up to it, the day-of you make sure to call them and write on their Facebook wall to make it “Facebook official,” you remind them that this is their day so you will go anywhere they want, you attend the event and make sure to buy them a drink or shot, and sometimes you give them a nice present if you are super-duper close with them. Sometimes you realize you are doing it for them because you secretly hope they will return the favor.
Oddly enough, now that it is my turn, I don’t really want to do anything. I feel strange making people congregate and dish out money so I can spend the next day nursing myself back to health. I almost want just to go out to a romantic Italian restaurant with a few friends, enjoy a nice bottle of wine or two accompanied by a good mushroom risotto, and call it a night. What is wrong with me? Is this what they call maturing, because it feels weird. I better, as Moonstruck’s Loretta Castorini says, “Snap out of it!” because I am not changing diapers just yet. Time to book the room at the Borgata!
