Sydney Life

What could be more joyful than celebrating your birthday? There's cake, alcohol, friends, and best of all: presents. Many, many presents...just for you. From the giddy anticipation you feel while unwrapping (it looks like a DVD, feels like a DVD, you know it's a DVD - but just in case, you'd better touch the corners warily, squint at it like you're a scientist looking for the seam in the atom and shake it really close to your ears...) to the heights (or depths) of drunken birthday pashes, birthdays are the days we can dedicate (justifiably) to ourselves.

It's not my birthday. Don't send cards. Yet.

It's a month to go (today actually - a month today!) and my birthday is in full swing.

And this year, I can't wait for it to be over.

This year, I turn 21, and while I already have the keys to the house, I am having a 21st.

Some of you, who haven't reached the point in your life when every weekend is consumed by 21sts, buying 21st presents, organising trips to outer Siberia for 21st parties and sending RSVPS to 21st invites, will balk at my lack of enthusiasm. It's a birthday, you will cry. Yep, I hear ya: it is a birthday. But, unlike years past, when it was solely MY day, and MY day only; this year, it is also my Mum's day, my Nan's day, my Dad's day, my stepmother's day, my Great Aunt Agnes's day and God knows who else my Mum has invited.

I told my parents last year I didn't want a party. I don't want a fuss: so many people I know went to such great lengths for their 21sts and hardly enjoyed themselves on the night. I think it's best to be casual and just plan to have a good night, chatting and dancing with your mates, celebrating International You Day as it was intended.

My Dad thought this was fine. You've been to one party, you've been to 'em all...

Mum was harder to convince.

Why don't you want a party? Patricia's son's daughter's niece had a party and they loved it. Everyone went. Everyone had a lovely time. There were speeches and there was a beautiful cake and everyone toasted the birthday girl and I just don't know why you wouldn't like to have something like that. That's what people do. We'll hire a hall. Yes, that's what we'll do. We can get caterers. And a cake, we'll need a cake. Who will speak? your brother? No. Me...no, I'm not the speaking kind, I couldn't. No, really...I couldn't. Well, alright, just something brief. And we can get a jukebox, everybody likes jukeboxes. One of the karaoke ones. Yes, you girls loved karaoke when we got it for your 13th birthday. Yes, what a good idea. Mmmmm.....I'll ask Tracey at work if her husband can do the invites, they have this whizz-bang printing thing on their computer, you should see her kitchen tea invitations: wasn't Shelley in Recruitment green? Because you know she had hers the week before Tracey's....

Rrright.

My immediate thought was: NEVER GET MARRIED.

And then I thought: what do I veto first? The hall, the jukebox, the caterers, the speeches, the cake, the whizz-bang invitations...? And what exactly is the protocol for speeches entitled, "Mum, Your Ideas Suck, Let's Do This My Way?"

It was my brother who finally convinced her that it was, indeed, my party, and that it was ok if I did it my way. After she recovered, she reluctantly agreed and put away the Party Poppers.

My birthday is not alone in this plight: weddings are fraught with the same kind of political fracas. Forget the Middle East - if you want to start a Gaza Strip in your own office, try inviting only the people you actually want to invite to your wedding. Oh no, this is a big faux pas. It's all or nothing: you invite none, or you invite every single person, including Derek, the faithful water-cooler filler.

And don't ever agree to be someone's bridesmaid. Bridesmaid is a pseudonym for "A Group of Girls Who Will Stand Next To Me, Wearing Hideous Dresses and Clown Make-Up, Thereby Making Me Feel Comparitively Superior and More Beautiful." That's the real reason they are performing that weird combination of laugh/cry/smile/eyes downcast as they walk down the aisle.

Christenings are similar: it would seem natural that children attend christenings. After all, most christenings are performed for children. But don't ever, ever think it's ok to bring your own child to a christening as a guest. While it's cute and endearing for the soon-to-be-anointed child to cry maniacally, if your child should do the same, prepare to be glared at in the style of Hillary versus Monica.

No matter how much we prepare for these events, no matter how much money we spend or how carefully we budget, they never live up to their expectations. I have a friend whose parents spent the better part of $8000 on her 21st, and she spent the whole night in the toilet throwing up, because she ate a bad oyster from the catering company. I've had friends who have spent next to nothing on their parties and had great nights. Expect little, get lots. That's my motto, and I'm sticking with it.