Yet Another Pandemic Birthday
For my 40th birthday in 2018, we had a BBQ at the house with tons of food and dozens of friends and family in attendance. My 41st birthday was at a karaoke bar, complete with private room, apps, drinks, and a large group of friends.
Ages 42-44, however? Those have been a different story.
Having three birthdays during pandemic times has been eye-opening to say the least. Facebook reminded me that the first one in April of 2020 was celebrated virtually with a small group of friends playing an online version of Cards Against Humanity (which got us through the strictly Zoom months of the pandemic). For the second one last year, I expanded the online invites to friends back home with a larger party pack of games to play. That led to other people buying different party packs, and we’ve now done a couple virtual game nights together.
This year, I thought about a couple different options, including renting a private movie theater, since that’s one of the venues we still haven’t been back to yet. It felt pretty safe, since I knew the people who would be there would be vaccinated. But the cost per person would’ve been a lot more than what you’d pay going to a movie, so I nixed it. We decided to go back to simple pleasures this past weekend—Cards Against Humanity in person in our back yard. With an Italian dinner delivered and desserts galore, it was great to be away from the computer screen and actually in each other’s presence again.
That’s pretty much been the M.O. for my local friends’ birthdays this year, and it’s been a huge relief. More places are opening up, we’ve been out and about more, unmasked, and the vaccines have helped to calm our nerves. Of course, as I write this, another variant is starting to bring up the COVID numbers again, and people are back to discussing their concerns about gatherings. But at the moment, I’m working without a mask in the office, and I know several teachers who are back in the classroom, also maskless.
We’re at an interesting time right now, complete with hindsight and various already-developed coping mechanisms to deal with these tough times. We made it through almost total lockdown, exclusively working from home and doing takeout for meals we didn’t feel like cooking, unsure of how long that would last. We connected through memes and social media posts about our shared experiences and emotions. But now, we’re feeling the fatigue of dealing with this for more than two years, wanting desperately to put it behind us and get back to what was considered normal in the before times.
I know it’s been a relief for me to feel comfortable leaving the house and spending time with others. It was tough figuring out if I should have my book launch in person, even if it was only two months away, knowing that safety concerns could change on a dime. I’m grateful hybrid events are becoming more ubiquitous. It means my friends and family from back home in Massachusetts can join in, which I’m excited about. If nothing else, the pandemic normalized virtual events, bringing my East Coast peeps into my West Coast life.
But I also think what the world went through in general was a long time coming, and something that was necessary to reset certain things. As a society, we took a much more critical look at our healthcare system and those struggling to work within it, the education system and how much our teachers endure, and who we consider to be essential workers, complete with wage and benefit overhauls. All of a sudden, the phrase “life’s too short” took on a whole new meaning.
I definitely feel that much more these days, especially after we discovered a lump in my right breast a month into the pandemic (more on that to come in next Monday’s blog). In June it will be two years cancer-free for me, and it both feels like last week and a lifetime ago. Time was already moving too fast as I got older, but COVID took that and distorted it even further. So at this point, I’m just trying to be as present as I can, as grateful as I can, and as understanding as I can. Because at the end of the day, we’re all just trying to make it to that next birthday.