PRESENT DAY SNIPPET: MY BIRTHDAY IN MADEIRA

The first is always the most difficult

I’m on holiday in Madeira, having a lovely time. My husband surprised me with a beautiful card this morning – in an effort to ‘declutter’ my life in recent years I’ve eschewed presents and I mean it so Michael is not in the doghouse! – my Grammy gave me a birthday hug (my mother’s mother is on holiday with us) and then I proceeded to cry at breakfast. Why? Well, it’s my first birthday without my Father.

My Father loved celebrating my birthday with me after us missing out on so many together when I moved to the States, so when I moved back to West Yorkshire to live with him (post-separation from my first husband), he ensured that even if I was on holiday on my birthday, I ‘stopped by’ before my big day to receive his funny card (often something about being late, loving shoes, overpacking, having a husband who did the housework), and carefully chosen present. 

In my ‘declutter’ years, that present was mostly vodka, my favourite tipple, but I’ve been the recipient of some beautiful, well-chosen presents over the years from my Father and my husband (and others, of course), including one year when Father planned and paid for all of our journeys (his, Michael, Grammy, and I) on a steam train on the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway line (not far from where we live) to have strawberries and champagne in the ‘Gentleman’s carriage.’

It’s been a comfort to re-read the beautiful inscriptions in some of the books he’s gifted over the years. He was always great at choosing books for Jae (my older sister and his other daughter) and me that mirrored our disparate interests with Jae’s interests more aligning with our Father’s and mine with literature of the more modern variety (but we have all been lifelong avid readers).

For one birthday, my Father and Grammy (Mum’s mum) visited me when I lived in Weiden in der Oberpfalz, Germany. We had a lovely dinner at a favourite restaurant in the Market Square, not far from the Altes Rathaus (old city hall), which is now a charming tea shop, ice cream parlour, and other little shops and on the very top houses the biggest bird’s nest I’ve ever seen.

On a sort of happier note, I’m turning some indeterminate age (although I think my face is starting to tell the story or maybe that’s the media (mis)perception I have) between 36 and 39 (far too close to forty). I’ve never tried ‘the botox’ or ‘the fillers’ but that might happen in the next so many years (does it hurt and how expensive is it to maintain?) except I’m the sort of person who barely has time to moisturise my face at night, nevermind have a thirteen-step skincare, gua sha, face roller routine (although I do have an anti-ageing laser that I need to start using because non-ablative lasers do work – I know because I wrote for the company!). I prefer to spend my evenings reading and unwinding watching a TV show or film with Michael and my mornings writing before work. I used to do lovely ‘woo woo’ face yoga class with my beautiful friend, Marie, who looks absolutely amazing (in her early fifties no less) so it really does work but I’m also too lazy for that!

Love and best wishes in the universe to all who find first birthdays and first Father’s Days without their Dads difficult – and every subsequent year after that.

Ageing has a way of making us thankful for another year and reflective on time and mortality – or maybe that’s because I’m approaching forty.

Some images of that birthday trip in Germany with my Father. (He had an Army-issue haircut on that trip, which he still reminded me of years later.)

Let me know about the Botox thing!