it doesn't end well

I turned thirty-one this week and unfortunately have not yet grown up.  Birthdays aren’t a big deal for me, but people like to do nice things for you on your birthday and it’s rude not to let them do it.  My parents and sister got me frames to frame things from the campaign to match the frames they gave me at Christmas.  They also each gave me the same birthday card, it’s an inside joke in our family about disregarding Stefanie (ostensibly and in sensibleness our voice of reason).  However, my sister gave me the gift that we all want from our family without intending to.  

No, she did not die and leave me a huge sum of money. 

And people do like to do things for your birthday.  When I lived in Phoenix the birthdays were epic.  I knew by the time I was there to ‘go with the flow’ of a birthday.  When I was twenty-one I didn’t know this and despite James’ best efforts I wouldn’t drink and didn’t get so drunk I was sick from it so James had to do it FOR me.  When things happen on my birthday or if we do something it’s always spectacular: mullet hunting in Philadelphia comes to mind or climbing the Coliseum in Rome.  I didn’t know it at the time, but this would be the birthday that will (hopefully) end all birthdays.  This was the mother of all birthdays.  It was birthdatgate.  Is there a cliché I am leaving out? 

My sister took me out for dinner after work.  I had worked about ten hours and it was a depressing, unproductive day.  I didn’t really want to go out for dinner but I was hungry and I wanted to cook and clean up a dinner less than I wanted to go out for one.  We agreed up on a restaurant and as soon as I got home we were supposed to turn around and leave again.  My sister made me change clothes because I didn’t want to go anything on my work clothes.  I did what she wanted but wasn’t totally aware of why at the time. 

My sister and I don’t get along very well because I am a jerk.  I try to go along with things when we are and not upset the boat.  We went to a place she likes to go with her friends (and can now never show her face in again).  We ordered wings and French-fried potatoes, she had diet Coke and as per Lent I had iced tea.  I will own the truth: I wanted a beer or a diet Coke, but because it is Lent and I had to work the following morning I passed on both respectively.  I should not have passed. 

After a bit I didn’t feel good and we asked for the check and I went outside for fresh air while she finished the transaction.  There was a bar two doors down from where we ate without an outside patio for working on lung cancer.  These people, who had gotten a beer and maybe even a diet Coke with a little something, something in it all watched me come to the realization that my dinner wasn’t staying with me and that I wouldn’t have time to make it to a respectable place to toss my cookies.  Instead, somewhere on Bardstown Road – a road once maintained by Abraham Lincoln’s father – there is a puddle of sick left by me on my birthday. 

I didn’t do this last year when I had a thing or seventeen to drink.  I didn’t do this ten years earlier in Rome with my college buddies when drunken vomiting would be considered a right of passage or cute.  I did this from food poisoning like an old person on a public sidewalk like trash.  I did this being heckled by drunks who, I hope, slipped in it on their way home.  You’ll notice that I had the presence of mind to take a picture of it but not to find a toilet.  I also text-messaged my sister mid-hurl to try and light a fire under her.  It did not work. 

I spent the ride home picking vomit out of my nose and fielding phone calls about my birthday and how it was going, “I made a big splash…”on the sidewalk of Bardstown Road. I'm really glad my sister made me change my clothes.  Vomit and argyle do not mix. 

And as an epilogue to my tale of sadness: today, when I was at a meeting at work one of my coworkers said, “I thought I saw you throwing up on the sidewalk last night but I realized that you wouldn’t do something cool enough to puke on the side of the road like a Hobo.  You don’t party seriously enough.”  Indeed, DeAnna pointed out, had I stayed in Phoenix and partied seriously I wouldn’t have had something on my stomach to make me sick.  How is leaving your dinner cool?  Seriously?  Upon elaboration as to how ‘cool’ the experience was or wasn’t, there is nothing cool about pulling a half-eaten fry out of your nose.  I really need to chew my food better. 

And this is what my sister gave me for my birthday: Blog Fodder.  I wasn’t going to have anything to say to all those well-meaning people who asked, “did you get anything nice for your birthday?” 

Comments

[iidly]

I am so sorry you puked, was it food poisoning or something else?

[golfwidow]

Your birthday present is going to be the belated thing, which will be how good that applesauce or gingerale will taste when you feel better.

[Margaret]

Poor you! I hate throwing up and the lack of control over it. You've always known that I was controlling, right? Happy Birthday anyway and at least it's over with for another year.