The Odd Years

I always take stock some as the new year approaches, but that heightens after the new year, for my birthday follows shortly thereafter. There is something particular I'm thinking about this year. I have never liked having an odd-numbered age. Even before my age started to become an unpleasant thing to contemplate I disliked being, let's say, fifteen instead of fourteen. As it's only my twenty-ninth birthday coming, maybe I shouldn't be too bothered on that point, but the other thing bothers me.

I don't imagine that I have to think too hard in order to figure out why I don't like the odd birthdays. I have a history of your standard obsessive-compulsive habits. I never could bear stepping on the line between segments of sidewalk, and had to step on each the same, even number of times. A lot of that stuff is not much of an issue anymore, but I remain somewhat ill at ease with my very age being an odd number.

I wish there were something to do about that. I could lie. It would make me feel better on two scores to say I was still twenty-eight, but worse due to the lying. I could say thirty, but crossing that threshold is going to be terribly unpleasant, and I could stay an odd number forever rather than doing it. Anyway, lying one way or the other feels like far too much of a narcissistic thing to do. I'm not Joan Collins or something.

I've got to at least pretend to age with some kind of grace and dignity. In the past, I've managed to get over it before too very long. In trying to call up the suffering I endured two years ago at the age of twenty-seven, I came up empty. It must not have been too bad, because I'm sure I'd remember. I'm fairly good at that. Anyway, the year will undoubtedly fly by as they always do, and I'll be comfortably ensconced in an even year again soon enough, for good or ill.