For people who know me, this is not a secret: Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. This isn’t really a popular opinion, and it usually tends to get overshadowed by Christmas, but it’s my favorite. There are two simple reasons for that—food and presents.
“Wait a minute,” you say. “There are no presents on Thanksgiving. You are talking about Christmas, dummy.”
Normally, yes. But my Thanksgiving involves presents. That’s because my birthday is right in the midst of the Thanksgiving hoopla. And since it’s usually easier for family to get together once and call it good, we usually combine Thanksgiving and my birthday celebration. I know people (like Karli) who sometimes get their birthdays mixed in with Christmas and hate it, which I can completely understand. However, in my case, I’m the only one getting presents, and you can’t really ask for a better dinner than Thanksgiving dinner, and I prefer pie to cake any day, so I dig Thanksgiving birthday. It’s really pretty amazing.
Every few years, like this year, my birthday actually falls on Thanksgiving. This year was even extra special, because it was also the day I turned three whole decades old. Yep, I’m 30.
And I don’t get it. I don’t understand the big deal with it. My friend Luke keeps trying to impart the gravity of my elderliness (especially since he turned 30 earlier this year), but it fails to hit home. I’m convinced that it’s because I’m horrifically out-of-shape. Luke is a runner and takes pretty good care of himself. He probably doesn’t need to confront his mortality till the number of candles on his birthday cake pose a fire hazard. I, on the other hand, being the guy who treats his body less like a temple and more like a rented bouncy house, have had back problems and trouble breathing and achy joints* since I was in college. I’ve felt like I’m in my 40s since I was 20. Realizing I’m 30 makes me feel like I’m somehow coming out ahead.
*And ::ahem:: a receding hairline.
This doesn’t mean I don’t feel old. I do. It’s just not my age that makes me feel old. You know what did make me feel old the other day?
Yes, it’s the inferior of the Ghostbuster movies and it’s 23 years old and I can remember when it came out and I did the math. That’s not what makes me feel old, though. I realized, as I was watching it the other day, that it’s the opening scene. You know the one, where Zuul Dana is chatting up her building superintendent and her baby’s stroller starts driving itself away, weaving through traffic and pulling up short of a bus?
No joke—scared me shitless. I may have peed a little, which also makes me feel old, but that’s a different post for a different day.
As I was watching that, I realized 1) that even though I’ve seen that sequence a hundred times and knew how it would end, I couldn’t keep from being so terrified for that baby’s safety, and 2) as concerned as I was, I was even more focused on the fact that the baby’s stroller didn’t have straps. On a busy street! In New York! Okay, that part made me feel young, but the first one, where I was legitimately scared for a baby I knew was going to be fine, was when I realized my age.
I could no longer watch it the same way I did when I was little. I’m a parent. I’m old. I see the world in a different way now. No going back.
It’s cool though. It seems like I’ve always felt old. Now turn down that racket. Some of us have to work in the morning.
You know what Indiana Jones says:
“It’s not the years. It’s the mileage.”
-Dork Dad
Man, do I have some city miles. And I’m probably due for an oil change.
Happy cupcake to you! And I’m two years older, so that should make you feel a little younger. It’s mathy so it must be true. And I love ghostbusters and bill murray and did you know they’re talking about GB3 sometime in the near future? I know.
Yeah, I think they were talking about starting shooting next summer, but it’s been postponed. Again.
This is the one that always gets me:
::shiver:;
-Dork Dad
WHY WON’T THOSE THUGS STOP THEIR SHOOTING FOR ONE DAMN SECOND AND CATCH THAT BABY HOW CAN THEY BE SUCH HEARTLESS BASTARDS DIDN’T THEY EVER HAVE MOTHERS AND WHY ARE YOU SHOOTING THE CRIB DON’T MAKE ME COME AFTER YOU
::ahem:: I mean—nice.
Thirty isn’t so bad, I’ve found. I’m more nervous about 31 which is coming up for me in January. It’s like you’re settling in to oldness.
Happy birthday! I still like you even though Ghostbusters 2 is better. What?
Everyone’s entitled to their own terrible opinions, I suppose. Happy early birthday, old-head.
Happy Belated Birthday!! I hope there was lots of pie, and, I’m also voting for The Untouchables shoot out.
PS You got me again with adorable baby photos!! Damn you!
I gotta know my audience. I’m not unaware that the cute keeps em coming back for more.
You know waiting up all night with a bottle in my hand just killing time till my kid wakes, is fast becoming my favourite part of my day. It is when I find new blogs to devour, and I have to say this one here, yours, obviously, was a pleasure (yeah, I read up until when your Squatch was born). Though, finding out you’re a fellow creative writer was awesome, but I am also terrified at the idea that you are judging my over use of the comma. Because how could you not, being an english teacher? Egads. However, it is three am where I live so I am probably dropping more of those dastardly things than usual. Sadly, I also started a sentence with “because” and I am fully ashamed now. Anyway I had a point, I promise you.
I really, I mean really, enjoyed your blog. So thanks.
Thanks. It’s always fun to meet new people. Keep reading, and you’ll realize my own issues with punctuation diarrhea. My love affair with the dash is bordering on adultery. I’m glad to hear you enjoyed it, and I’m now going to go read the hell out of your blog.
The dash is classy. Obviously the more one uses it the more classy they themselves must be! What’s going to be wrong with that?
Well, that’s just logic, pure and simple.
How did I end up the old lady blogger?! THIRTY FIVE, BITCHES.
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