A DAD'S LIFE:SEVENTY-FIVE per cent of the family's birthdays take place in December. Throw in Christmas and I can normally sneak mine through under the radar. Not this year, this year is the big fuss, this year has a zero at the end of it.
The missus claims I’ve been moaning about turning 40 since the day after my 30th, and she’s not far wrong. Over the past year, its looming hulk sometimes cast such a shadow that to distract myself I would focus on the fact that I was nearly as close to 50 as 30. This worked like cranking a corkscrew into your eye to deflect from a headache.
The kids didn’t help. Grown-up birthdays are viewed with suspicion by children. They can’t quite understand why we bother to celebrate once beyond a certain number, which is certainly a valid point. Obviously, turning from six to seven is of earth-shattering significance, but 36 to 37, come on, that’s just stupid.
Up to this one, they had taken an interest in my age only as a yardstick against which to measure their own. They could practise mental arithmetic and become accustomed to a sort of mathematical consistency through playing with the two numbers.
But this one brokered a sort of sad sympathy. I don’t know if they learned it from us, school or the world, but the furrowing of the brow and an “it’ll be okay” stroke of the hand from a 10 year old nails down the sense of an ending rather than offering any sort of revitalisation.
They felt sorry for me, proper sorry, if only for about 30 seconds before they started to laugh, but it was still there. I received sincere little motivational statements: “You don’t look too bad, you’re not that squidgy, you don’t need a stick to walk,” all uttered with a deep, meaningful, soulful, maintain eye contact at all costs nod. They were signing me off.
I woke on the fateful day and felt marvellous. The night before, I consumed. Everything put in my way went in the mouth. I stopped worrying about having a good time, stopped worrying that other people were having a good time, and just put things in my mouth. All manner of things, and they all tasted good.
Consciousness peeked its head round the corner that morning and I expected the blast from behind the eyes. You know the one, where you feel your face has been superglued to the pillow and any movement causes a wave of motion through the cranial arena that hammers pain sensors with crowbars.
I checked the back of the teeth with a suitably arid tongue. All present. Always a bonus to wake with a full mouthful of porcelain. The eyes cracked with a peeling sensation but no needle insertion pain. I felt motion was possible without bodily evacuation. So I moved, and everything stayed put. Result.
A vertical position was attained without any undue concern, just in time to greet the breakfast tray laid on my lap. Even the food stirred a hunger rather than a horror.
And since then it’s become apparent that the wait exceeded the reality. I never expected to get to this age, I really believed somehow time would stop, just for me and I would turn Benjamin Button and work myself over and back between 18 and 39 for eternity. There’s no rationality in this, I had simply decided early on that going beyond a certain point wasn’t a runner.
Now that it’s happened I’ve realised I’ve always been an old codger. Finally, my body has caught up with my psyche and they can settle into mature, rather than decrepit, splendour together.
I haven’t woken and screamed for all that time back, it’s more like waking with relief that I don’t have to keep up with some demented perception of myself as a dynamic, thrusting, youthful individual. I’m about as thrusting as blancmange.
They gave me cake, and made me tea and sandwiches, let me watch whatever I wanted on the telly, sang me songs and clapped, slagged me off and laughed at me. You cranky, gripey old buffoon, you’ve got to the point you’ve always dreaded. I really have, and it feels quite nice.
Today, as this column is published, the missus hits the same milestone yet she, who has always been comfortable in her own skin, is officially performing a Benjamin. Happy 37th wifey.