27 on 27

There is something about birthdays that always makes me incredibly philosophical. Maybe it is the symbolic ending of a year and the urge to balance the ledger at the end of it. Or as I grow older I realise,  maybe it is the fear of one more year slipping by and the bucket list growing only longer. Whatever it is, while birthdays are always exciting for me, I also seem to learn more about myself every year. And this re-acquaintance with myself has been the defining trend of my 26th year.

The last time I wrote a birthday post, I was at an extremely content phase in life. I had everything, or so it seemed. Great friends,the boy I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, wonderful family, an active life,lovely work environment at school,  all that beautiful music and the promise of my entire life stretching in front of me.

A lot of that still remains, but a lot has changed since then. My 26th birthday is a big blur in my head. It was one week before my defense, my mom was with me, Ani and family made my day by visiting me, but I think I ghost walked through most of it. The day I defended, I felt such incredible relief, almost like an iron being lifted of my chest. I never realised how much stress I had bottled up. And then it came pouring! I was stressed about finding a job, I had conflicting ideals in my head about career and compromise, I didn’t want to step out of my niche area of research, I had papers to finish, things to wrap up before a, then, unknown and uncertain future. 

And then within a few weeks I grew up. I had a job, a car and was living by myself in a new town. While it was incredibly overwhelming, it was also very exciting in the beginning. People at work were sweet enough, I had a new city to explore, new restaurants to try out, I signed up for a bunch of classes, paatu class to look forward to each week, I gallery hopped- SLR in tow, got to the front row in my yoga class, lost all that dissertation fat, it was all good!

 But slowly it started to fade away . I lived in denial for a long time. Sure there were bright spots. I took vacations, paatu class and yoga class is great fun, I read a lot and in general got a lot more time to indulge in the things I was interested in. But the effort it took to keep myself busy enough to not think about anything was not sustainable.  I put up a brave front to friends and family talking about my classes and job, refusing to acknowledge the depression of every weekend, the questions about weekend plans at work, the looks  I imagined I got when I said table for one, the incredible loneliness because of the lack of social life. Instead of reaching out and making an effort, my ego just pushed me in to a shell . S bore the brunt of it all as I whined and whined to him, spited him for having fun with friends, behaved like a completely needy, miserable sop, and to give him credit he put up with a lot of it. It wasn’t until he complained about how I am always cribbing that I realised what I had turned into. My sunny personality was gone. I had turned into an always polambifying case , the kind of person I always had contempt for.

I had my meltdown a few days back at the prospect of having to spend my birthday by myself. And then I snapped. I counted my blessings,felt disgusted by the extent of my self-pity and have decided to make the best of my last few months by myself and in this town! This year I plan to be content and happy! I have a lot to look forward to : I have a wedding to plan, an awesome holiday that I have always wanted, the prospect of a wonderful life with S, a new job in an awesome city. And I have all the things that have always made me happy. My wonderful family, and the best of friends who have lived and loved with me for so long! My last few months in KY are going to awesome because I will make them that

And that is the greatest thing I learnt about myself this year. If I put my mind to something I can make it happen -a license, new car and a maiden solo trip on the inter-state all within 2 weeks. The story speaks for itself.  S is so comfortable in his skin and self content that he can live through it all, act by act with little support casting and with whoever happens to drift in. Me, I need an audience! I need co-stars, make-up, costume, props and the whole rigmarole.  And that is the second lesson for me. To give in a little, and learn to be more self-content. To learn to live with less validation, confirmation and yes I will grudgingly admit, a little less materialism.

As much as I needed this purge of a post, I am also extremely self-conscious about publishing it and putting it up for all of the www to see. But I think, I need to start letting people see my weaknesses. I never let even my closest of friends see me weak and needy. I need to stop that and bust my ego a little. Of course, if you ever bring this up in real life conversations with me, I will just blame it on an Amy Tan overdose over the past weekend And what plans for the birthday, you ask? I am going to check into a spa and treat myself to the best pampering money can buy

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