It's my 50th birthday today. I wasn't going to say anything about it, but here I go.......I usually hate birthdays. It's nothing to do with how old I am - I have always hated them. It sounds ridiculous but it's just the aweful remnant childhood memories that make it that way, still and 40+ years on. Birthdays, any family celebrations, were always a stressful time in my original nuclear family, winter kids parties, sleet and cold, the dread and the hope that this time it just might be enjoyable. After a while I gave up expecting anything, focused on getting through the day and on with the rest of the year.
This year was going to be different, a new positive attitude would go a long way to making it better. I was doing really well too: a good surf to start the weekend, an early celebratory curry dinner with friends on Saturday, a great pair of bamboo socks, dinner with Robin on Sunday, full English breakfast this morning, some nice presents. Buying some new (not Op Shop) clothes with the birthday money my mum and step-father sent me.
I get home to find my (biological)father has sent me a card from his Perth nursing home. Someone must have helped him do it because I don't usually get one. He has Parkinson's. He has tried to write a message for me, it's almost legible. Somone has deciphered it and written clearly underneath. It just makes me cry. I still hate birthdays.
When I rang to thank Mum for the cheque she tells me that my step-father has cancer, all through his bones, and my niggling fears are realised. I didn't really accept the diagnosis of pleurisy.... recovery was taking too long and I suspected something else. She found out yesterday and didn't want to spoil things for me......what could I say to that: don't worry Mum, it's just a birthday.
