28

I have a love/hate relationship with birthdays.

In high school, I always felt like I was the one to go all out for everyone's special day.  Not because I was expecting the favor to be returned when my day came around, but because my own birthday was my favorite holiday.  Halloween, Christmas, they didn't measure up.  Birthdays are the one day you can legitimately make it all about you for 24 hours.  In the end though, I was let down because the most I would get from anyone that wasn't related to me was a simple "happy birthday."  And honestly, I think that's only because in high school they always announced birthdays during the morning announcements.

In college, my freshman year roommate, Erika, threw me my first surprise birthday.  It was the best thing ever, only to be topped the following year when I was blind folded and taken to dinner at Medieval Times and brought back to my apartment to a second surprise party.  Birthdays in college just seemed like a lot more fun because the people around me seemed to enjoy them as much as I did.  I didn't need expensive gifts, just having friends coming over to yell surprise or just to stop in and say hey was enough to make me happy.

Everything since college has been a bit of a mixed bag.  Nothing horrible, a few near disasters, but on the whole, it's been mostly okay.  Maybe I'm expecting too much and that's why as midnight draws closer and my 28th birthday is officially over, I feel a little underwhelmed/disappointed.  This year especially since I'm in a bit of a life limbo at the moment.

All I know is that as I type this, there's 7 minutes left of my birthday.  Everyone that I really truly care about has said happy birthday except for one.  And in a day and age where Facebook alerts you to whose birthday it is, there really isn't an excuse to forget anymore.  And unfortunately, I'm letting the one birthday holdout shape my view of my 28th birthday.

So on the whole, 28 could be worse.  I just wish there wasn't the one holdout...