Hmm .. and there goes another birthday. One year closer to reaching senility, I fear. XD
The best thing I learnt about celebrating birthdays this year’s that you’re not only supposed to celebrate your birthday on the day itself, you’re allowed to celebrate it for the entire
My habit is to put out a birthday wishlist (I get the red squiggly line beneath the word, telling me it’s actually wish list – two words – but personally, I reckon it looks totally fine being just one word XD) come the first of the month noting down all the presents I’d like for my birthday. Cruel mother jeers at me that I’m too ‘old’ for presents now, but like she always snaps at me when I ask her when she goes on about matters of age, age is a relative thing so if I want to put out a birthday wishlist, who is she to stop me? Besides, I’m not forcing anyone to read it and buy me birthday presents XD
As usual, my birthday celebrations start on the second Thursday night of the month, when I attend my monthly book club at the Logan North library. ‘Twas actually the first one I’d attended for 2019, because during the January one the parents and I were holidaying down in Melbourne and then the February one got cancelled because there was like some Valentine’s Day event being held in the meeting room where we usually have our book club!
I feel very loved once I enter the meeting room where book club’s held; I’m immediately greeted with a birthday card and a birthday present from one lovely member, Barb! Afterwards, another lady hands me a birthday present and a third presents me with a homemade birthday card~
I’d heard earlier that if you eat at Cha Kee on your birthday and show photo ID, you can have a steak set for one dollar! I started looking around for anyone who could take me to that (I was reluctant to ask mother for fear she’d only lemme eat half XD) and awesome Aunty Erica said she would! :D She also brought along Aunty Harmony, so after Alyssa gave my demented left hand a session of OT, they came to pick me up for an early lunch. Originally I thought the offer was only available at Cha Kee but for some reason the aunties pointed me towards Cha Kee Too.
After we’d all taken a seat, a waiter wandered over and I told him that today was my birthday before asking him, “Can I get my birthday steak set for one dollar/do I haveta go back next door to Cha Kee? The waiter says here’s fine, then asks would I like my steak set with rice/spaghetti/chips? I choose chips and after he’s gone I whisper excitedly to Aunty Erica and Aunty Harmony, “Hey, he didn’t ask me for photo ID at all! In that case, I should come back here tomorrow, say it’s my birthday again and get another steak set for one dollar!” Both aunties burst into laughter, before I’m told that I won’t try that because I look trustworthy. XD
We have so much fun conversing over lunch that I didn’t receive mother’s calls and Whatsapp messages! Turns out we’d all totally forgotten what time she wanted me home by because I had physio in the afternoon. Whoops, sorry mother; look on the bright side: for my forgetfulness, you got to bite my head off. XD
This year, my birthday happened on a Wednesday. I have the ‘good’ physio every Wednesday, so no sweat. I felt loved when after I arrived, both teachers immediately bid me happy birthday. I even got a birthday present from my physio student; she’d bought a blue/yellow mug and painted an eye over it so that it resembled a minion! Like I’m sure everyone who even knows me very slightly is aware, I am totally besotted with the yellow jellybean-shaped creatures from the Despicable Me franchise. XD
After physio, I head to Hakataya for my free ramen before heading home for a shower. Then it’s off to choir practice!
See, last year, some random church aunty told mother about some inclusive community choir and told mother to make me join. Initially I’d refused, coz don’t you haveta stand to sing in a choir? Post brain injury, while I do most things seated (I even have a shower sitting on a shower chair) I can walk a little (despite the cruel and unfaithful God’s best attempts to leave me wheelchair bound for life ><) but the hardest thing for me to do is stand. I seriously hate it, because whenever I’m standing I’m terrified I’ll lose my balance and fall over and then I’m screwed coz I’m so pathetic I simply don’t have the capability to get myself back upright without something to pull myself up. So if this choir needed my standing participation, no way Jose.
To my complete astonishment, mother allows me to attend using my manual wheelchair! Now, nobody has ever told me I’ve got an incredible voice or anything, but I’m fairly sure I can sing in tune. So okay, if you let me participate whilst I’m seated in the wheelchair, okay.
Several weeks/months earlier, we’d celebrated the birthday of another choir member with cake plus two songs from his favourite band and I’d enquired, might we celebrate my birthday with cake and songs too? See, I hadn’t had much luck with birthday cakes neither last year nor the year before. For my special decade birthday two years ago, had it not been for the fact that I’d had two wonderful birthday parties complete with cake, I’d have basically gone without. See, I’d asked mother could I please get a birthday cake, only for her to snap at me, “No, why should you get cake? I didn’t get cake for my birthday last year, so you don’t need one either.” Only after I’d wibbled at her that surely, surely she couldn’t deny me cake for my special D
Mother looks caught out for a split second before she collapses into embarrassed laughter. “Oh, I thought that since you’ve got inferior tastebuds you wouldn’t figure out! I was baking your cake last night but since it was late and I was tired, I didn’t see that the recipe said use unsalted butter because I accidentally use SALTED butter!” XD
I laugh my head off, before telling mother it’s okay; the salty cheesecake still tastes great. Just really weird. XD
But back to choir practice. Since earlier we’d celebrated another choir member’s birthday with cake and two songs from his favourite band, I’d asked our conductor Cath might we not also celebrate my birthday with cake and two songs from Westlife? (They’ve been my favourite band since before my brain injury.) You can imagine my excitement when Cathy said yes!
Since I was born @
After singing Westlife’s ‘Unbreakable’ and ‘You Raise Me Up’ we’d moved onto the song we’d been focusing on this year, Christine Anu’s ‘My Island Home’.
Immediately, Cathy (our choir conductor) squeals “Happy Birthday!”; directly after that, Mr. Jay (her husband and our guitar accompanist) strums out the opening chords for the Happy Birthday song and then everyone breaks out into a rendition of the Happy Birthday song for me! Immediately afterwards, choir rehearsal resumes. XD
But that’s not the end of my birthday celebrations with the choir because afterwards, there’s cake and holy moly, the cake’s MASSIVE! After candles are lit and the birthday song is sung again, I start on the task of blowing out the candles. From years back, I vaguely recall you’re meant to blow out all the candles in one go if you want good luck that year? I later commented on some Facebook thread I surely hoped that wasn’t the case because it took me like TEN attempts to blow out all the candles on that huge cake and if that was true, I was probably destined for a TERRIBLE year! :S XD! Luckily, another member of choir assured me, “Well, at least you managed to blow them all out in the end. That’s gotta count for something.” XD
Huge thanks to Madonna from choir who bought the cake from some bakery and took it on not one, not two but THREE buses to arrive with my birthday cake at City Hall! (Have I already said? Our choir holds weekly rehearsals in the basement of City Hall). Madonna’s an awesome lady; once, when we were singing some complicated round, I asked Madonna could she please look at me whenever we began a new line and I’d practise my otherwise non-existent lip reading skills and sing along with whichever line we were singing with. Another time, our conductor was sorting us into our singing positions and Madonna, suddenly realising she wasn’t standing in the right area, goes “Sh*t, I’m in the wrong spot!’ and dashes off to stand with her fellow singers. “Madonna!” I snap, “Language! That’s two dollars into the swear jar!” Then we just both laugh our heads off. XD
Anyways, the birthday cake she brought for me was so huge, there were leftovers! I urged everyone to have seconds and some obliged but there were still slices left afterwards! In the end, I took a full clear lunchbox home of leftover cake and gave that to dearest dad, telling him to enjoy but asking him could he please save me one slice? Dearest dad does~
That night, I enjoy one slice of my second birthday cake; third time lucky, after only one small slice of birthday cake two years ago and a SALTY cheesecake last year, mother finally goes and buys me a cheap chocolate sponge cake from Sunni Bakery. XD
But wait, there’s more! Did you know: this year, I got THREE birthday cakes!
One of my high school teachers I’ve become Facebook friends after I graduated high school and Facebook came into being’s Mrs. Perkins and somehow her daughter Jacinta and I became Facebook friends although neither of us remembers who sent the friend request and who accepted it! XD
After hearing about my woes in getting a birthday cake, Jacinta offers to make me one and sure enough, she drops by my place one afternoon with a simply AMAZING cake she’d baked for me! Indeed, dad loved the cake so much, he gobbled it all up and only left me one tiny little slice! XD
Like years previous, my final birthday celebration for 2019 was dinner down at the
While I resemble my dearest dad in looks, voice-wise apparently I sound just like mother. For some reason, my voice went all squeaky after everything went pear-shaped suffering my brain injury and surgeons had to shove a tracheotomy tube down my throat to help me breathe; after it was removed and sound came back (mother reported that at first, I’d mouth ‘mum mum mum’ at her but no sound came out; I wouldn’t have a clue since I didn’t come back to myself until I was in the insane asylum XD) for some reason, my voice went all SQUEAKY! XD Meaning someone would ring our home phone, I’d squeak “Hello?” and the caller would immediately recognise the speaker as me. However, since I celebrated my11th year of release from the insane asylum (better known to everyone else as the Brain Injuries Rehab Unit of the Princess Alexandra hospital XD) back some three months ago, I suppose my voice tone has gone down sufficiently enough for people to again mistake my voice for mother’s, because when I answer the ringing phone with a “Hello?” it’s Mr. Hall’s voice that replies with a cheerful “Hello, Ling!” I laugh and reply, “How you doing, sir? Would you like another guess as to who answered the phone?” XD
So some night soon after his call, the parents and I meet him for dinner down at The Glen Hotel.
As expected, we have a lovely time~ After diner and dessert, Mr. Hall sits back with a contented sigh. “Well, I’ll be all done after one more scoop of vanilla ice cream.”
I immediately join in. “Oh, me too please, sir!”
Horrid mother immediately snaps no; I’m about to whine at her is she trying to ruin my birthday when Mr. Hall interrupts. “Oh, let her,” he tells mother. “It’s her birthday, after all.” Meaning for the first time ever, I got second dessert! :D I feel like a hobbit; I’d say winner winner chicken dinner but this was dessert and winner winner chicken dessert doesn’t rhyme. XD
And so ends my birthday celebrations for 2019!
Next post here .. a movie review, maybe? I recently saw the Lion King movie with real animals, and I stand by my assertion that The Lion King’s simply the. Bestest. Movie. Ever!! XD Anyhow, until then~
Cheers,
Em. ^^
