Deconstructing birthdays

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 16:26:09 -0400

deconstructing birthdays. show you care by not waiting or saying empty words. be careful who knows your birthday.

i wish to start this blog with something new and interesting, something you hopefully havent thought of.

in the following text i will use birthday to mean birthday celebration.

can we improve birthdays?
why are birthdays all the same format within north america?
why do we have birthday celebrations?

i feel differently about my birthday; partly because of differences between past birthdays’ expectations and outcomes, partly because i might have questioned their format more.

must birthdays always be on the actual date you were born?
what is the best moment and action you can do to show you care about someone?
if you like gifts or whatever, why not have it year round, why only once per year?

what is the goal of birthdays? is it to show that you care about that person?
if so, why are they the one who usually organize it?
and why cant you organize many birthdays per year for your friends?

Frequency

i can see advantages to people celebrating their birthday once per year.. if every birthday needs some preparation like a personalized gift or a trip or reservation, then you might need about a week to prepare. so if you have >4 friends, once a month would be too often; and the next easy time increment to remember is once per year. also for a similar reason, if you have lots of friends, ~40-50, then anything shorter than once per year might also be too often.

but i tend to have ~5-15 friends who I am close enough to, that i want to organize something with to celebrate them. and i long for a way to celebrate the relationship we have at a faster frequency than once per year. id like something that is more continuous and personalized.

Default gifts

if you dont personalize the gift to the person, and give them something that’s often gifted, something non-unique, arent you just moving money back and forth?
give a gift you dont care much about, once per year, and later that year you receive a gift you dont care much about.

dont you buy the things you need when you need them?
if so, then there’s a high chance any gift given to you is either something you dont want or something you already bought.

do you wait before buying until your birthday? why wait, isnt it inefficient?
if your friend(s) knew about it, and wanted to, they could just buy it earlier.

if youd receive cheap gifts that are not personalized, dont the person who bought it just lost time getting it, and it does not show how they care as much as basically anything else they could do for you, like just being present for you?

i guess the only thing that makes sense to me as unpersonalized gifts are expensive gifts. but dont people usually hate those because they feel they
have to give back to the gifter more than they feel they can afford?

interestingly, unpersonalised gifts might be more of an issue for me than others: some of my friends are poor artists who have good handicraft skills. they can more easily gift art they made, and receive common utility tools or furniture that they cant afford to buy, as gifts.

Birthdays as passwords

governments, health institutions, banks, and other important organizations still use the birthdate as authentication.
so as long as this is the case, it makes sense for the fewest people feasible to know your birthday.

if you have a birthday, even with only a few friends or family, it is likely that you or someone else will leak this information. people like to share that they have been at a celebration, and, contrary to the government, birthdates are not seen as sensitive information by the general public.

one interesting experimental idea here is to choose a random date within the year and declare it your “birthday” (or rather when people celebrate it). after all, if people can choose their name, why not when we celebrate them?

Dont lie

if the only thing you do related to my birthday is say “happy birthday”, i am going to assume you either want to pass as if you cared about me but actually dont, or that you are scared of what a median person would say or do if you dont say “happy birthday”.

if you know me and really care about me, show it: give me 1 sentence (or more) on what you like about our relationship.
or ask me what you can do to make my life better, like a service you can give me.

to me saying “happy birthday” and nothing else feels like a lie: it’s like claiming you know me and care about me, but you actually dont because you dont do anything to show you care.
it’s worse than staying silent, if you dont know me:
i dont expect strangers to care about me in that way, and much rather people dont lie.

i wonder if i alone feel like this, or if others feel like this as well. if you feel similarly, please let me know; and if to you a simple “happy birthday” means something, let me know what you think it means to you. i am curious to learn more about how people feel in that situation and why.

If you care

if you care, tell me what you like about our relationship; especially if it’s something unique to our relationship.

give me feedback on how i can improve.

think of something you can do better than me and tell me that you want to celebrate our relationship by offering to help with that skill you have.

next time you have food, and think ill enjoy it, offer to share it with me and tell me that you appreciate me.

with every move, every action, you make in my presence, you can show me gratitude.

dont wait for a birthday, go and show appreciation in your relationships now.

comment by sending an email to nicolas.m.lacombe@gmail.com with the title of this post as subject.