It’s Your Birthday

Happy birthday. I hope you had a lovely day.

I didn’t see you today, I didn’t get to hug you and cheer for you first thing in the morning, while you were being grumpy and saying you hate birthdays. I know you don’t care, birthdays were never really your thing, but I care for them and it matters to me that I wasn’t there to wish you a good one this year. In a more selfish manner, I will care even more when the time comes for me to put a higher digit behind the two, and you wont be there to clap your hands and make a toast. I will blow out the candles on the cake and scan the crowd in search of a familiar face. Your empty chair will make me cringe, then I will stop thinking about it because the notion of your absence will be ruining my special day, and I can never have my birthday ruined.

I heard of this, birthdays without friends before. I just never knew they happen, until it happened. It must be one of the many unpleasantries that come with age.

When it was time for you to turn 16 we had all the time in the world. We could mess up as much as we cared to, and it would all be okay in the end; we had hours and days and years ahead of us to figure it all out. There were no consequences. 12 years later, life should be more than fixing screw-ups and merely trying to get things right.  We are now adults, and everything we do resonates loudly and insurmountably. Or so we tell ourselves when we sacrifice the people we love for our dreams.

Decisions. Movement. No compromise. Never ever compromise.

When you turned 18, we talked all the time. Your company was easy, even effortless. The conversations were long or sometimes they were short, but we never forgot to tell each other everything. Sometimes we didn’t, but we knew stuff about each other anyway. That’s what happens when you talk to somebody a lot: at some point you don’t need to verbalize your every thought anymore, the other person just sort of knows. Now we get busy and distracted by other things all the time and more and more. Isn’t it  funny how you get used to not talking to people? Not “ha-ha” funny, but you know, funny like 10.000 spoons when all you need is a knife kind of funny.

When you turned 23, we took long drives in your car, when you turned 24 we went to a rave in the woods and rolled on the grass and took pictures. When you turned 25 we had a picnic near a river. Those days seem like ancient memories now, barely even real anymore, because so much time has passed. Good thing I kept the photographs.

At some point it all got so messy and weird, as messy and weird life gets when you live it for a while. I can feel the full force of life pulling people away from me, and pulling me away from my people. I feel the pressure every second of every day. I look into once-friends faces and I don’t know what to say anymore, because my eyes don’t recognize the person they’re staring at. Time is the silent killer of all things. Nothing lasts, I tell myself, all stories are designed to end sooner or later. I just thought that we would make it to the epilogue.

I get angry. I find myself deeply resenting you and then myself and then London and then I don’t know, destiny for lack of a better word. I motionlessly wait for the phone to stop ringing when you call because I can’t talk to you when I get like that. I don’t know what to say, but I do know that if I keep quiet this time, my silence will tell you nothing.

That’s what happens.

You stop talking and then you don’t know what to say. I know I had all these other thoughts in my head a second ago, I wanted to tell you about this fantastic album that I think you’ll like, or tell you how I went into the forest the other day  and played in the snow like I was three years old or something. I wonder where all these thoughts went now and I wonder who this slow person with a limited to non existing vocabulary is. With the undertow screaming only three simple words: “I miss you.”

I wish there was a dramatic twist of some sort that I could blame for this divide between me and my best friend. Then, at least, maybe I’d get a story out of it. But the slow watering down, the slowly drifting apart, the friendship becoming vanilla and stale, all so embarrassingly  predictable and cliche, even I find it boring. When I don’t find it sad, that is. Because in it’s core, that’s exactly what it is: terribly, utterly, undeniably sad.

But lets not talk about it today! Today is your birthday, and all I ACTUALLY wanted to say before I interrupted myself with nostalgia, is that I wish you all the best on your special day. I hope by the time of your next birthday you will no longer feel anxious because all of the things you didn’t do, but happy and proud of the person you turned out to be even before you turned 30. How amazing is that??? You have this amazing life and you’re not even 30. Wow. You go girl.

Now, I might not be there to see you and cheer for you for many birthdays to come, but I will be happy to hear about how great everything is turning out for you. From you, a common friend or Facebook, somehow I will keep tabs on you and your fabulous life, and I will always feel so excited for you. Always.

So happy birthday to you, darling friend. I hope you had a lovely day.