after nineteen times around...
02/17/04|11:44 a.m.

First things first (i.e. important things that I want to mention before talking on the subject I came here to discuss.) Today is Double Dessert Day, and this the whole world (or at least the portion of it blessed enough to read my journal) must know! Double Dessert Day means that it's my grandma's birthday (the first one since she "passed into glory"^); she had a dear sweet tooth, and therefore the day was always celebrated with not one, but two, desserts. (Which is an especially big deal when you have fifteen children to feed.) So. Sweet tooth indulgence, ok? With love to St. Grandma. (My mom said yesterday that today would be a high feast day in the local church - a reference to the encouraged Catholic practice of venerating people in your community even if they haven't quite made cannonization. And I mentioned St. Grandma, which I don't think I've said since the week of her funeral.) So, yeay. Happy my grandma's birthday. Tell stories, tempt cavities, recite ballads, pray rosaries, and throw yourself into as many mysteries and Westerns as you can. In the name of my mommy's mom, my grandmommy, Loretta.

I love that name. My tendency to fall in love with names so often is one of the many beasts that tends to trip up my certainty that I don't want to have children. I end up reminding myself that having a child just to embody a name is not a good idea. Likewise, having a child just to put cute clothes on them, or because their little faces and bodies cause me to whimper softly and fill with kisses, or because a switch flips when you put an infant in my arms are not good reasons. They may seem like good reasons - especially the last couple. But weighed against the reasons I should not have a child, i.e. because I cannot be a parent (and that will come to be necessary at some point, if I fall for the freaking baby) they simply can't hold up. I will make a very good aunt when one of my siblings makes a very good parent. And if this changes, so be it. I'm 19, and I don't care what the statistics say; the fact that I'm not inclined toward parenthood right now is a good thing.

(Do you see me getting scared that I might be? Nothing's ever simple as it seems.)

Yes, even that baby thing has come up again recently - but maybe I can come into it this way, via the road I intended to write: My birthday approacheth, with the type of speed that keeps me off the highway. It is, in fact, one week from today, significant because that lands it exactly one week after my Grandma's birthday, and just a few days before my Nana's birthday, which is being celebrated (shh, it's a surprise!) on the 21st, also known as my anniversary, which to say the least (and quote the doctor) feels a little "bittersweet." Nonetheless, 2 1/2 years! 2 1/2 years of die-bulimia-die, and live-Mary-live! (Die-anorexia-too, but that remains harder to gauge. 2 1/2 years in recovery, with the understanding that 2 1/2 years without active bulimia is not just a cover-up for active anorexia. Stupid different categories confusing happy things. Anyway.) 2 1/2 on 2/21, and then just after, 19 yrs. Over the weekend (which includes yesterday - because I have no idea what day it is, generally speaking) both parents asked what I wanted to do in terms of celebration, and damnit, if that is not a question I despise. When did this happen? When did I start responding to, "What do you want to do?" with "Skip it" - like some punk adult who doesn't know how cool it is to have a day that's all about them? I mean, I like to think every day is all about me, but this is the day when the rest of the world know that it's all about me. (I also like to pretend exorbitant egotism in order to balance my often tapped-out store of self-esteem.) I don't think I've completely transformed into that person, if only because - if I have - I refuse to let it stick. This is, however, my first birthday since my parents separated, and all the different significances of the 21st (2 1/2 years in recovery, 2 1/2 years abstinence, 2 1/2 years since I was admitted, one-week-less than 2 1/2 years since Tracy was admitted, and 2 years, 2 months since she died) can make a month feel heavy on my back, not to mention a day.

Rereading the entry on last year's birthday, I feel compelled to acknowledge the "I don't want to grow up" factor of this also. It's not that I'm one of those silly adults who doesn't want to celebrate because I have wrinkles now; it's more like - I still have all these fears saying growing up means being alone, and so etching another tally mark onto the wall scares me a bit. 19 is the final teen, you know? And I don't really have a fondness for being a teenager; I don't much feel like one. (Despite this, I still think it's a good thing that I have another year of it; in part because I won't yet go insane over being 20 and also because as much as I feel I'm looking back on being a teenager, I still have this whole catching-up thing to do. Catching up on the life I didn't live from the time I was, say, eight until now. Stephanie said to me once that maturity is good and all, but if it ever looked fun to be 16 (which, you know, I was at the time) I should feel free to dive right in and such. I don't really feel now that I'm acting unlike my peers - except for the whole, I'm not keeping with the schedule/ I "should" be in college silliness. More than that, I just feel that some of those things I didn't feel or felt so ashamed of feeling deserve to be revisited, deserving healing where they need it. I'm looking back on my life, at all these awkward, shameful moments, and I'm realizing, "Yes, I made a fool of myself and was embarrassed, but I was a 12-yr-old with a crush, and it happens!" Not knowing at the time, any of the times, that what I was feeling was a crush, and what I was doing was acting like the cute, klutzy, silly imbecile who can't focus on anything other than the object of their infatuation (and at times real affection, adoration, or love) I took it rather hard. I was rather hard on myself about most things. But now, maybe, it can be ok. And maybe I can consciously learn to say things I heard from such a distance in high school.

The other night, I dreamed about a bunch of Spanish boys (or were they Argentinian?), two of whom I called sweet for helping me with something. One of them kept walking with me after the aid, and replied to my sweet with, "You're pretty" (or was it "cute"?) And I remember stopping in the hallway, in my dream, to turn my head and search his eyes. Because pretty and all her synonyms are still so foreign to me, they catch my ear like words I've only just learned. Even in dreams, they stir up surprise. Me? No, you look too normal. Check; are you sure there's no one else around? ...I'm trying to start doing those things, to be ok with who I didn't know I was, and to be who I don't quite know I am. And that sort of work makes a marker like 19 years oddly personal, something to be shared quietly. It makes my birthday so much about me, it feels odd (ironically.) Birthdays are about parties and people and presents, right? But I just want to ruminate. Well, ruminate, celebrate, a little of both, I guess. I still want to run around like a feminist princess, a tough-stuff fairy-human-girl in knee-high boots, self-crocheted scarves, and marker-made t-shirts: fluff-filled, surrounded by confetti and balloons. (For those of you who witnessed the NY-Boot-Incident, the boots will remain figurative if the birthday involves any amount of actual walking. Torture me once, shame on you; torture me twice, etc.)

So what I've decided (I think) it really comes down to for the big one-nine is me. There's all this (unintended) pressure in my birthday, this year especially, all this need from (some) family members to be told they did the best thing they could do, to be reassured over and over again that I know they love me via some material thing. And I have nothing against material things (I may hate shopping, but I do love books and music and cards and so on, so forth, sew buttons) but I don't like the pressure involved in opening a gift from someone who's struggling with that sort of insecurity. I'd rather just be grateful for their presence. (No homophone intended.) I believe that's a big part of how I ended up choosing a shopping spree (me! what the hell was I thinking, and hell, yeah, did I survive something that day!) to pass those 24 hours last year. This year, I still don't quite know how I'll pass the time, with my mom (and probably brother) and then with my dad (and probably brother) - plus, my other two brothers and my sis will be in for the 21st...(shh, surprise!) so, that might involve some happy-birthday-mary time as well. That time will most likely rock, although it'll be short-lived, and far too much of it will take place in Brigadoon. Celebrations work far better when they include my entire nuclear family (or at least all of my siblings, as I suppose "my entire nuclear family" ain't likely to happen again anytime soon. I still haven't asked about a timeline for the divorce. I don't want to know, and yet, I really don't want to suddenly hear, "So, we sign the final paper tomorrow" and feel like it managed to sneak up and slam against my face. Oy.) But I'm just thinking about me, and all these unknown parts, how I had love I didn't know was ok love, how for the first time in my life, I like the fact that I could hold a baby in my body, although I still don't ever want to do so. Things like those. Right now, I'm happy with what I have and the presents I can give myself. I prefer people to packaging. So, who knows... Decorate this darling body that's withstood so much for me, play a game or ten of Uno, watch Finding Nemo the one time no one will yell at me for reciting each line as it comes. (Which I don't really do. Much.) Maybe just that. And some birthday cake, of course. I am my grandma's granddaughter, and rare will be the circumstances of a future birthday that I don't have my cake and eat it, too. Some things a girl must do to honor the girl-she-was, who couldn't. And my mom was the daughter of a woman who celebrated her own birthday with double desserts, and a father who worked as a gourmet chef at the premiere restaurant in the city. So, I must give cake the nod.

I probably won't have my mouth back by then. It's still rather dry, except for the pus and mucous and other nasty things. It's still discolored with lovely whites and browns and greens. I still wake up to find my front teeth look like a scab because they've been bled onto all night. And the bumps and the pain all remain. The treatment calms it all for the twenty minutes or so after I take it, but nothing's healing. Soon, a specialist, I guess. First come the culture results. And more pudding. And more applesauce. And more whining and pouting and telling myself not to be so damn amusing because it hurts to smile. I think, when this does heal, I might need to grab hold of my meal plan a little more firmly again. Just like a stair railing I don't normally need to hold. I think I'll feel better when I realize that yes, I can still eat, even more healthily (in the sense of, this is the most balanced meal as opposed to, this is healthy while still being weird and flexible, the way most people eat) and then I'll just catch the railing a few times as I run down the stairs, then not at all.

And someday, baby, someday, I will slide down (around a spiral staircase.) And won't we grin then with our healed and happy mouths.

~me

^she's still the only person I know who demands the use of that phrase

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