September 13

It’s still my birthday right now, hour-wise. I was born on Thursday September 13, 1973 in the early afternoon, somewhere amidst a fun-filled year of Watergate, The Exorcist, The Godfather. Gravity’s Rainbow and the great OPEC oil embargo. My mom could have aborted me. I was among the first babies to be born in the Roe era—literally 9 months after that momentous Supreme Court ruling.
I share my September 13 birthday with some amazing luminaries. Jean Smart, the Designing Woman who played the sharp-witted First Lady to the buffoon-like President in last year’s installation of “24,” Claudette Colbert, Jacqueline Bisset, Lauren Bacall, a slew of writers (Roald Dahl included) and Milton Hershey, the genius who brought you Special Dark. But my favorite fellow birthday girl has to be the singer and miraculous poet, Fiona Apple. Fiona is crazy talented and just plain crazy. I remember the 1997 MTV music awards when she, this tiny wisp of a thing, took to the stage and delivered a heartfelt speech wherein she called out the music industry moments after it gave her a great big Grammy—“This is bullshit, and you shouldn’t model your life on what you think we think is cool . . .” It was so stupid and beautiful and brave. Ms. Apple is my heroine, with her potty-mouth, bad attitude and scathing lyrics: “You fondle my trigger then you blame my gun.” “It won’t be long ‘til you’ll be lying limp in your own hands.” I truly do love her and therefore will be channeling my inner Fiona for my 33rd year. I failed to locate a mascot, totem or idol for year 32 and it will go down as the year I tiptoed around my snarling husband and worked my ass off to appease a screaming one-year-old. Otherwise, it was me dodging the cat’s claws and teeth as I opened up the back door to let her in. Oh, and I finished my thesis. I can’t believe I nearly forgot that I finished my thesis and graduated from Sarah Lawrence with an MFA in nonfiction. Ok, so something good happened in year 32. Still, it seemed the hierarchy in our home went much like this: Husband. Baby. Cat. Rabbit. Laundry. Litter Box. Mama. I was the fake smiling robot who made everyone dinner. I was one of those dead-in-the-eyes housewives from the 50’s, like Julianne Moore in The Hours or, I don’t know, a Stepford Wife with no soul.
But that was 32. This is 33. It’s a palindrome. It has to be fabulous . . .just like my fabulous party last night. I’ll write more on that later. Right now I’m off to drink a gallon of airborne to stave off this weird post-party ick I’ve got going. Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me. This year will be oh so much bet-ter. Happy Birthday to me.