Joke of the Year: My life with an Apr. 1 birthday

It’s never uncommon for children and teenagers to bemoan their circumstances as “the worst.” Growing up, everyone has had a moment of thinking, “no one else has it as bad as I do.”  This could stem from being unable to attend a party at school, not receiving a certain toy on Christmas Day, or begging your parents repeatedly for a dog and hearing them say, “We don’t think you can handle the responsibility,” even though you’ve tried to tell them that you do know how to take care of other things, like that time you babysat your sister, remember, even though they claim that she “crawled outside” because you “didn’t bother to lock the front door” and “really, who does that when they’re babysitting?”

Anyway. My point is that, in all of these tragic scenarios, everyone fails to realize one key thing—you never have it the worst. Someone else always has a more unfortunate story that you do.

And that someone is me.

I’d like to say that it was a crisp spring morning on April 1, 2002, when I came into the world. However, in actuality, it was 2:34 a.m. after a long, surely torturous process that I was born via a Caesarean section (yes, I was never truly born, only removed. I have heard this before).  Had I been born a handful of hours earlier, my fate could have been avoided altogether.  My birthday would have been March 31st, and my life could have turned out so much differently.

It took me several years to realize what I had suffered by being born on April 1st. As a young child, I assumed that “birthday parties” and “presents” and “cake” were all a fictional ploy of movies and books. It was when I was seven, attending a classmate’s party, that I realized the intent of such an event.

“What did that mean?” I asked her. “Why did that girl call today your birthday?”

She looked at me strangely. “Because I’m eight. I was born eight years ago. Today.”

“Oh,” I realized. “Well, my birthday is April 1st, then.”

She laughed, shaking her head. “Good one, but April Fool’s Day isn’t for another couple of months.”

And I was left there, pondering my existence. Was I the “fool” she spoke of? Was my “birthday” only a joke to those born on other days? Was this why I had never experienced the taste of an ice cream cake, the joy of unwrapping a Barbie doll, or the terror of seeing a garishly-colored clown trying to hand me a badly-done balloon animal?

As April approached, I tried to build up my courage. I went to my parents on the first of the month and asked them if we could do something for my birthday.

They both stared at me, confused.  “What do you mean?” my dad finally asked.

“Today’s my birthday,” I explained.

Both my parents looked at each other and burst out laughing. It was a full ten minutes when they finally regained themselves enough to speak again.

“Oh, you,” my mother gasped out, wiping a tear from her eye. “Good one.”

And I was left forgotten again.

I thought the trend would come to an end as I grew older, but I was sorely mistaken. In high school, I tried to establish my birthday early, telling the date to my friends’ months before the actual arrival. I was met with scoffs and eye rolls, and eventually they told me to stop dragging on such a bad joke. I became “the fool” once more, with invitations to parties which I could never return. The one time I did attempt to invite my friends to my birthday, they sent back “LOL” on the RSVP and never showed up.

This curse plagues me even now. When I approached the head editors of The Normal, asking if I could write an article about my birthday, since that was when the edition would be released, I was met with laughter and “Sure, kid,” and “You can write a comedy piece, if you want, but we’re trying to be honest here. The Normal doesn’t lie.”

As I reach the 20th year of my mortal coil, born on a date lost to time and jokes, I am finally beginning to see the positives of such a burden. I can even enjoy such a prosperous occasion. This morning, I strolled into the backroom of Sweet Arts bakery and began emptying their safe’s contents into my backpack. When the manager threatened to call the police, I told her “It’s okay. Today’s my birthday.”
She was still laughing when I walked out the door.