Missing birthdays...

I had my twenty-eigth birthday on March 15th. This one was nothing special. Steve sent me a nice card, and my youngest brother sent me a text message. I spent the day cleaning the house, and I took myself to dinner. I ate at my favorite Thai place, and the waitress that I've become friends with bought me dessert. That is the extent of it.

One of my friends had been texting since the beginning of the month about doing something for my birthday. When it came right down to it she wanted to go out, drink a lot, get trashed. I told her I would rather go to dinner, as I didn't feel like getting trashed, and was just getting over being sick. After that I didn't hear from her again. I'm sorry, but if it's my birthday, shouldn't we do what I want to do? It's not like I was asking her to pay for me.

My immediate family doesn't celebrate birthdays because of their religion. However, my aunts, my grandma, my biological father, and my cousin usually send me birthday cards or call me. This year nothing. I'm feeling a little sensitive about that. Maybe I'm over reacting a little... but to have noone call me or send me a card hurts my feelings a little. It really made me feel like crap... very alone - especially with my boyfriend being 1700 miles away. My grandma and one of my aunt's have sent me a card every year since I was born. I always look forward to the cards and phone calls because it lets me know they are thinking about me - especially since I only see them about twice a year as they live in Ohio and I'm in Florida.

Maybe I should just give up on birthdays in general. I've only had one good one since I started celebrating again. I didn't celebrate them either for religious purposes until I turned 20 and then I changed religions and started celebrating again. The two birthdays before this one, I was still dating Eric. He was out of town for work a lot, and it seemed like he was always gone for holidays and my birthday. So I felt alone a lot, but especially so on my birthday. By the time he got home my birthday was at least a week over so we didn't do anything. One year we fought and broke up for my birthday. One year he didn't give me anything - not even a card. Another year we went out to dinner with friends, which was nice.

Honestly the only good one I had was four years ago. Eric made me breakfast in bed and brought me up a small gift. It was a nice gesture and it made me really happy. When I came home he had bought my favorite cupcakes (white with the white frosting) from Cupcakes by Caroline. He had strung up a happy birthday banner, and there were some other presents for me. And then he made one of my favorite meals, and did clean up duty. Nothing huge, but it was nice and it meant a lot to me.

I'm not asking for sympathy. I just needed to vent. One of my aunt's finally called - to talk to my mom - and I happened to answer - she said, "Oh, I think I missed your birthday, well oh, happy birthday." Still nothing from the rest of my family.