Sunday, September 02, 2007

I begin with a four now

It's true. Being born at the very end of "The Summer of Love" means I am forty today.

It doesn't upset me.

Some people have done and will do an amount of gentle teasing - one of my oldest friends, with whom I went to school and who is exactly four months older than I, sent me a Shakespearen snippet text message to describe my forty-year-old looks to me:

When forty winters shall besiege thy brow,
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
Thy youth's proud livery so gazed on now,
Will be a tattered weed of small worth held:
...
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days?


It didn't upset me. In fact it delighted me (and I suppose I got what I deserved since I sent her similar Byronic message when she turned 36:

'Tis time this heart should be unmoved,
Since others hath it ceased to move:
Yet, though I cannot be beloved,
Still let me love!

My days are in the yellow leaf;
The flowers and fruits of love are gone;
The worm, the canker, and the grief
Are mine alone!
)

Anyway, poetry aside. I am not going to be one of these people who turn thirty-seven (or indeed, thirty-six) several times over. I have been given lovely presents, and my Spanish friend pulled my ears forty times (twenty on each ear) - a Spanish tradition, I am told. Apparently, they have the same tradition in Mexico, but the ears are pulled upwards.

I begin with a four now. I must be a grown-up.

26 comments:

trousers said...

Big birthday hugs from me!
And good for you for not forever being 36 or 37 - though I don't necessarily think it means you have to be a grownup. Not all the time anyway.

Someone I know, who is a few years past 40, says she feels sorry for me the fact that I'm not 40 yet - according to her, life does get so much better.

So - happy birthday anna!
x

Anonymous said...

And a Very Happy Birthday from me !
Much love to you xx

Kahless said...

Hyvaa syntymapaivaa!

or should I say

Penblwydd Hapus i Chi!

Congratulations to you, you old fogey you!!!
:o)

(Ahah, I have yet 7 months to go before the honour of a four!)

Reading the Signs said...

Oh, it's today! Mazel Tov - and Har! - and ?

zucquse - a jacuzzi that is also a drinks dispenser - which is just what you always wanted, isn't it?

Anonymous said...

Happy Birthday, Anna.

Too tired to think now, but as I remember, 40 was a good year.

Hope yours is too,
Kurt

Amanda said...

Happy birthday!

But no need to grow up now, eh? ;)

But Why? said...

Happy Birthday!

40? You lucky thing, you! A whole decade of beginning with a four. I remember beginning with a four. It was a good time. Jelly and ice-cream all the way through summer, work never got any more taxing than writing feeble stories about cats stuck up trees, and I had so much leisure time I didn't know what to do with it. And you get ten years of this??!?

Happy Birthday!

Merkin said...

Hyvaa syntymapaivaa!
*
Wszystkiego Najlepszego!
*
Co` latha breith sona dhuibh!
*
Z dnem narodjennia!
*
Torson odriin mend hurgee!
*
Another day, another dollar Proud Annie.
Have a great time and do everything I wouldn't do.

R.H. said...

I'm accused of risque-
Whatever I say.
So I may as well chatter
On any old matter
(Like are women of forty
Really naughty?)

-Robert.
(I hope so)

Anonymous said...

Dear all - thank you, from the bottom of my heart.

housut - I have kept telling people younger than myself for years (a decade, in fact) how my life has improved vastly after I turned 30. It is true, and I have no reason to expect the trend to be turning. My friend who sent me the Shakespeare message also pointed out it is her "best year so far". As for the grown-upness, well, it remains to be seen. I do have a "Clark Kent" persona who is very bespectacled and respectable.

As you may guess, I am appreciating the hugs from a younger man.

LavenderBlue - thank you thank you thank you.

Kahless, you spring chicken you, you have a lot to learn yet, before you earn a four. Ahem. Diolch yn fawr iawn, fy ffrind.

Signs - oh! It's wonderful! Of course it's just what I always wanted. Now, when we have the haggis party, we can all gather in the jacuzzi before, during, and after... mwah!

Tired Kurt - thank you. Don't tell me this is the peak of it, though...? I'm expecting to be, from now on, on a permanently upward curve, a perpetual winner... (NB This is, yet again, where Anna MR's failing grip on reality slips badly)

Amanda, petkins, I have a feeling you need to immediately give me your mobile phone number (never you mind the rest of the weirdoes gathered here will have it then, too, they are really alright and quite harmless (although you have to keep a very close eye on that Signs) ), but you know there was a bit of a cock-up on that front, you catch my drift, girl? Hope all is well. I haven't seen you in absolutely ages. xx

Tri Mutta, I know you're a relative newbie on this site of mine, but I would've thought you'd noticed by now that feeble stories about cats stuck up trees is what I have been churning out for, well, ever since I last began with a four...start as you mean to go on, is what I always say.

Merkin - thank you, kiitos, spasiba, and all the others. What, I wonder, is there left for me to do, then?

RH Robert - I don't know, I've never had one? (Trying my hand at risque, too, you see.)

xxxxxxxxx one each, kids, and no squabbling

Mellifluous Dark said...

Excellent vintage. Many of my greatest friends are 1967 babies.

Happy, happy birthday, Anna!

x

Anna MR said...

Ms Dark - thank you. We are indeed a fine, delicate lot, with much potential both for aging and for drinking. Yes.

Good to see you
x

R.H. said...

How-on-earth-could-you-know-that-slang!

I thought it was exclusively Aussie. Pommy, at the most.
You really are a little bundle of intrigue.

Pants said...

Hi Anna MR

I don't know how I missed this. Very Happy belated birthday to you.

xxx

Pants

Anna MR said...

RH - I have enough Pommy years behind me to have developed a Pommy persona. That explains most things about the weird old bag - no, wait - "little bundle of intrigue" that I am.

Esteemed Ms Pants - thank you. You know, I am sorely tempted to present you with a Finnish name (yours is very giving to translation) but cannot for the life of me make up my mind whether you should be called by your full title, in which case the meaning is important (something akin to "It really sucks", yes?) - it would then be Se On Niin Syvältä - or whether you should be just known as Pöksyt, Pants. Hmmmmmmm. If you like them, you can have them both, because I hold you in very high regard, Ms Pöksyt. xx

Amanda said...

Indeed! I shall find a way to get my number to you without any of this lovely bunch sneaking a glance at it.

Drinks must be had soon!

xxx

Anna MR said...

It's a done deal, Amanda - where there's a will there's a way, and I feel sure we can find one...

x

R.H. said...

Don't put words in my mouth, by golly. You're lucky you're good looking.

"Where there's a will there's a relative."

That's an old joke. Funny because it's true. Beneficiaries mourn what others get, I've seen them.

basest said...

happy birthday. there is absolutely no reason to be a grown-up.

Anna MR said...

Tread carefully now, RH - I am a staunch, card-holding member of the Equal Rights for Ugly Fat Wimmin group.

Basest (are you supposed to be upper-case or not?) - thank you, and lovely of you to be nipping over again. I take comfort in your view that I can continue to be infantile into my fifth decade (sounds grim when put like that, doesn't it?). I am, of course, aware that you are a mere spring chicken and the weights and worries of adulthood (to be or not to be) haven't touched you as yet. Regardless, it is good to know the younger generation don't see me as one of those completely ludicrous dinosaurs still trying to act all hip whilst using totally antiquated lingo and generally making asses out of themselves. Yes.

xx

R.H. said...

Well thanks but I only look at faces, the rest is a bonus, or not.

R.H. said...

I've got a pal (now living in Queensland) who was a tit man and who'd roar if he saw a big set in the street. It was embarrassing, and funny too.

Anna MR said...

That fact, RH, is something I have very little to say to. Except maybe your pal would be more, um, normal, if he'd been adequately breast-fed as an infant?

Reading the Signs said...

Hei Anna four-oh - and nah nah nah tiddly pom :)

Anna MR said...

Tiddly-pom indeed, esteemed Signs. Still enjoying, I gather and hope?

x

R.H. said...

Thanks. I could say more, but it would make me laugh too much.