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bewize
My birthdays are cursed.
True facts. They really are.
I no longer celebrate them, except in a twisted sort of way, when they're over and I've survived. Let us look at a few, shall we? I believe these will illustrate my point.
But before that, I should mention I have the second most dreaded of birthday times. The worst birthday to have, I would imagine, is on Christmas or Christmas Eve. The festivity of your birth is totally overshadowed by the festivity of another birth that happened two thousand years ago, whether you believe its implications or not.
Nope, I’m not a Christmas baby. My birthday falls in the summer - right smack dab in the middle, the day after the solstice. June 22nd. The time of year when there is no school, all your friends are on vacation, having childhood birthday parties is hard to pull off, and summer school destroys all chances of anything else.
But this is not the reason that my birthdays are cursed. This is just the reason that I celebrated so few of them in my childhood and didn't come tot he conclusion that they were cursed until I was older.
Examples, you say? Examples, I will give!
When I was seven years old, I planned a party. And by "I," I mean my mother. Anyway, I digress. The day before the party was to happen, my little sister went into the hospital. (This was not unusual, as she had severe kidney problems for most of our childhood.)
I’m sure I don’t have to explain – cancelled party, I was shipped to the grandparents, and we ate stale birthday cake a week later when my sister got to come home.
Ah, but that’s probably just a coincidence. I can hear you saying that from here.
Really? You think so?
Allow me to offer my twelfth birthday as example two. I had a party! Some friends, a pizza, loud music, a swimming pool, a very hot lifeguard who taught us all how to do somersault dives – do I really need to spell this one out for you?
Yep. I knocked myself unconscious on the diving board and had to be rescued by the very hot lifeguard. This is not as romantic as it sounds, because I had a horrible headache and a raging case of pre-teenagery mortification. (Spitting out lungfuls of water in front of superhot lifeguard? So NOT how I wanted to spend my twelfth birthday.)
Fourteenth birthday? Parents got divorced.
Sixteenth birthday? Flu.
Eighteenth birthday? Car crash.
And at that point, I learned to stop celebrating my birthday. It wasn’t worth it.
But, along came birthday 25 and I decided… surely, I’d been overreacting before. I mean, they had to be coincidences, right? Right?
Wrong.
WRONG.
SO EPICALLY WRONG.
I was working then, and leaving the office at noon so that I could meet friends for lunch. (Therein lies the downfall. Lunch with friends = celebration.) I walked out the front door of my office, got into the elevator and pressed ground.
I was alone in the elevator. It started moving. And then… there was a horrible noise. The entire elevator shook. This was followed by the most alarming part of all.
The elevator dropped eight floors.
Finally, the brakes kicked in, flinging me to the floor, where I huddled in a ball waiting for the crunchy part. When nothing else happened, I crawled to the emergency phone. I’m not sure what the man who answered my hysterical call thought. I’m not sure that he could understand me. I’m pretty sure that frequency is reserved for dogs and bats.
Suffice it to say, eventually security came. And then more security. And then the fire department. And finally, the elevator repair man. Ninety minutes later, I was free.
I had a sprained wrist and a broken cell phone from where I’d hit the wall and the elevator floor respectively. The elevator repair man came over to me and said, very excitedly, “Did you hear a banging noise on the top of the elevator?”
“Yes. I did.”
“That was the cable unwrapping.”
SCREAM
The building sent me “We’re so sorry, thank you for not suing us” flowers. See?
I finally arrived to lunch and was grateful that my friends had waited on me. We were sitting on an outdoor patio, and I was explaining what had happened, when a firetruck pulled up and the entire brigade ran into the restaurant next door.
There was a gas leak.
I'm not making this up. I don't think you can make this stuff up!
So, my thirtieth birthday is next. Who’s up for the party? The only thing I can promise is this:
This entry was written in response to the
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therealljidol Challenge 5: Open Topic. There will be voting for this week's entries. I will make sure to link to the poll once it is put up and I would appreciate it if you would vote for me if you enjoy my entry. As always, feedback is welcome and appreciated.![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-23 02:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-23 03:16 am (UTC)Great post!
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Date: 2008-10-23 04:59 am (UTC)My sister's birthday is Xmas eve. Mine is 17th of January. It is alright... although there were a few times it was cancelled... it doesn't bother me as I am older. The best birthday was the day I get called from the guide dog school telling me they found the perfect dog suitable for my needs, that was my 23rd birthday.
If you lived in Canada, you get birthday celebrations, in school, since school doesn't recessed for summer till the last week of june.
Loved how you interspersed it with a few cliparts with the entry... great job.
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Date: 2008-10-23 05:24 am (UTC)I laughed at that line, "You can't make this up!"
I hope your 30th makes up for the previous 29!
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Date: 2008-10-23 12:07 pm (UTC)I enjoyed reading :)
I would have thought a 31st Otober birthday might come with some odd incidents but you've shown that any time of the year can be so.
Loved the final 'scream' picture.
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:04 pm (UTC)I like your solution and will start eating birthday cake whenever I want from now on. :)
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:05 pm (UTC)You probably weren't quite as keyed up and expecting death as I was. Or perhaps it was merely speculation on what was going on that I remember.
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:05 pm (UTC)Your song is stuck in my head now... although it would be a great Halloween birthday song. *grins*
Thanks!
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:06 pm (UTC)I wouldn't wish anyone to suffer through an elevator experience like that. I still cringe when I get on elevators, only now I work 16 floor higher than I did then. *wry*
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:06 pm (UTC)Thank you. I hope it does too!
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:07 pm (UTC)October 31 is a good birthday to have. One of my best friends has it and he's never fallen down elevators to my knowledge. ;)
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Date: 2008-10-23 01:21 pm (UTC)But...I will repeat an oft quoted saying of mine: You beat the birthday curse in the end, the last couple have been blissfully uneventful, remember?
And remember your un-birthday "party" at my house? At 3am? With the annoying driver insisting on joining in?
Colonize
Date: 2008-10-23 04:13 pm (UTC)P.S. That cake icon makes me hungry!
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Date: 2008-10-23 07:31 pm (UTC)And I do remember the unbirthday party and the driver who wanted tea. I didn't remember it being that late at night... Of course, I was fried by that point anyway. XD
*hugs*
Re: Colonize
Date: 2008-10-23 07:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-23 09:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-23 10:24 pm (UTC)I don't know if you've watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but she always has epically lousy birthdays too.
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Date: 2008-10-24 02:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-24 03:41 am (UTC)Thanks for reading. :)
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Date: 2008-10-24 03:41 am (UTC)I'm glad to amuse! Thanks for letting me know what you thought. :)
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Date: 2008-10-24 03:42 am (UTC)Thanks for reading!
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Date: 2008-10-24 12:30 pm (UTC)My mom's birthday is the day after Christmas, most people forget her birthday and just give one gift for both.
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Date: 2008-10-24 01:32 pm (UTC)My mom's birthday is also the 13th, but so far I get the lion's share of the bad birthday mojo. *lol*
Thanks for reading!
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Date: 2008-10-24 06:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-24 10:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-24 11:52 pm (UTC)My best friend's birthday is boxing day, which I think is worse than Christmas eve - everyone's already over indulged and nothing's open. My mother was born on Christmas Day and she always got joint presents that were an excuse to spend half as much money. My brother is New Year's Eve, but I think he did better than my sister who is New Year's Day. I'm expecting in December and hope for her sake she comes sooner rather than later.
My family have been unfortunate with birthdays. Not nearly as unfortunate as you though :o)
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Date: 2008-10-25 02:21 am (UTC)My sixteenth birthday was cursed, though: my two best friends (one of whom was my ex) told me they were dating that day. The 'party' gets worse.
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Date: 2008-10-25 03:50 am (UTC)(You just need to throw out that awful June day, find a date that suits you better, and then celebrate an unbirthday like the mad Hatter every year!)
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Date: 2008-10-25 02:49 pm (UTC)(OMG elevator!!! That's one of my worst nightmares. I'm glad you made it out without any life threatening injuries!!)
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Date: 2008-10-25 05:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-25 06:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-26 02:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-26 04:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-27 02:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-27 06:07 am (UTC)I actually think the final picture really makes the post, LOL!
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Date: 2008-10-27 01:34 pm (UTC)Damn. That's really all I can say about the post itself. Oh, and that picture at the end is great!
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:09 pm (UTC)To be fair... neither have I yet. *lol*
Thanks for reading!
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:10 pm (UTC)I do still have internal dramaz about elevators. *sheepish*
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:11 pm (UTC)Unfortuante birthdays suck, it doesn't matter how tiny the unfortnate it.
Thanks for reading!
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:12 pm (UTC)Okay, I think your 16th beats my 16th for suck factor!
Thanks for reading!
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:17 pm (UTC)At the time... not so much.
And Mad Hatter! Yes, yes, yes! I love this idea!
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:17 pm (UTC)I try not to worry about them anymore, but alas, I'm not that well adjusted. :)
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:17 pm (UTC)Thank you for reading. :)
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:18 pm (UTC)Well, I won't hold it against you. ;)
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-27 08:18 pm (UTC)Thanks for reading and letting me know what you thought!
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Date: 2008-10-27 08:19 pm (UTC)I'm sorry you share my birthday pain, but thanks for reading!