Oh, Just Shut Up and Say Thank You

I've been in a little bit of a funk for the past few days, and I think it has to do with my birthday last week. It's not because I'm having some kind of existential crisis about aging, though. I know I'm still young, and even if I weren't I think it's a little silly to get all worked up about the process of aging. You might as well cry when the sun sets every day. (Although we'll see how serene I am about it when I turn 30... or 40... or 50...) No, what I have is an existential crisis about something else.

I had a really great birthday week, I'd say. It revealed a virtual embarrassment of riches, in both material gifts and in the form of people that love me. The problem I'm having is that, to me, it is also a literal embarrassment of riches. When you're faced like that, all at once, with an overflow of pitch-perfect kindnesses and love, it's a lot of pressure. I'm suddenly conscious of my great luck, my privilege, my blessedness, to be loved by these people, and fearful that I don't deserve it.

I don't always receive gifts and compliments well, is what I'm trying to say. It makes me anxious and melancholy. What if I don't deserve it? What if this poor person's affection is misplaced? How will I ever thank them adequately? What if I disappoint them, and then they rue the day they were ever kind to me? All of this good fortune can't possibly be a good thing. It might as well be frogs raining from the heavens or blood filling my bathtub, so certain are the terrible consequences that will follow.

You have no idea how much work it is, finding a way to twist a blessing into a curse. I'd make a joke about Jewish guilt, but I'm not Jewish (or Catholic) and thus have no cultural stereotype to fall back on.

Ultimately I suppose I'm just as deserving of a great birthday as anyone else is, and it's not very gracious of me to go around questioning the wisdom of those who care about me. So, just to be polite, I'm trying to accept it gratefully and without skepticism.

Dear Diary: Last week was my birthday and it was awesome. I am a very lucky girl, and there's nothing wrong with that. So there.