Still at the Window

On turning 50, surprise parties, and the kid who still waits for someone to show up.

Reasons, a digital collage I created.

Birthdays have always been disappointing to me. I also don’t like surprises.

I remember my very first surprise party. I was in third grade, maybe fourth. My mom said we were going somewhere. I don’t remember where. I was in the back bedroom of our project house, a three-bedroom, one-level apartment, getting ready. I was wearing my Betty Boop shirt, like I did most days. I loved that shirt.

My mom was yelling that we had to go. I yelled back that I didn’t have any clean underwear. She told me to just put on a dirty pair, we had to leave.

There was no way I was wearing dirty underwear and I was gong to tell her to her face. So I walked down the hallway into the living room, and all of my classmates and some of their parents jumped out of the kitchen and yelled, “Surprise!”

And there I stood. No pants, in a Betty Boop shirt that barely covered my butt.

My grade school photo

I was devastated. I ran back to my bedroom and cried for a long time. When my mom came in to tell me everyone was waiting, I explained that if I went out there, people would either know I had no underwear on, or that the underwear I did have on was dirty. Absolutely mortifying.

A room full of people who loved me showed up to surprise me and I was the one who couldn’t come out of her room to celebrate me.

I honestly don’t remember what happened after that. I don’t think there are any pictures. If there were, I threw them away years ago.

My father only showed up sporadically for birthdays, holidays and the court ordered weekend visits. So a lot of my childhood felt like looking out the window, hoping the people I cared about would come. Sometimes they didn’t, and that took something away from the ones who did.

I turned 50 on Sunday, and that’s what I’m thinking about. Not the years, not the accomplishments. I already did that reckoning at 40, another milestone birthday, the year my husband died. That birthday I looked back at everything and decided I was happy with my life. I’ve done most of the things I decided to do, obstacles and all.

So 50 isn’t about taking inventory. Even though I probably have more life behind me than ahead of me, and that doesn’t scare me at all. I actually like getting older because I know it is a privilege denied to many.

The other day I watched a video that said birthdays aren’t celebrations for everyone, and it made me feel normal. I’ve always felt a little awkward in my skin here on earth. I feel too much. I think too much. In some cultures, a birthday isn’t a time for celebration. It’s a time to go inward and excavate. I resonate with that. I do a lot of reflecting, but I think that’s what artists do.

For the seven days leading up to my birthday, I sat down every night and talked to my ancestors. Why? Because I figure they’re gone, and they probably have more insight from the other side. One night it was my dad and I asked him the same questions I’m asking here.

I’ve always felt more connected to people in death than in life. Maybe that makes me weird, but it’s true. Death is easy for me to talk about, maybe because I’ve been exposed to it so much. I understand it. If that unnerves you, I get. Death isn’t for everyone, but uh, it kind of is.

I feel closer to people who are gone because there’s no restriction anymore. And because there is no physical body to animate, they always show up. And they did. Every night that week. Even my dad.

Alice, it's Violet… a digital collage I created when my grandmother died. That’s her on the left.

Have you ever felt that? Like you could communicate better with someone through meditation or prayer than you could when they were here?

When my husband was alive, we always made sure we were away for birthdays and holidays, mostly because we couldn’t take the pressure of showing up in a way that felt commercial. I’ve kept that tradition. I see my people when I see my people. It doesn’t have to be on a certain day.

So why am I still feeling disappointed? I keep coming back to that question.

Here’s what I came up with. To feel disappointment, you have to have an expectation. No expectation means no disappointment. But how do you not have expectations? Is that something I just keep working toward in my own self-awareness? Is it even possible not to have expectations?

I really thought I was on to something, and then Sunday, my actual birthday, came.

Someone closest to me said they sent me a birthday gift. All day I found myself at my window half a dozen times, peering out of the curtain to see if it had arrived.

It was getting darker, and I looked out one last time.

It never did.

And in that moment I realized, I am still that small eight year old inside, looking out the window, waiting for someone to show up for her.

And then I realized this is why I always show up for everyone else. Except myself.

— Jolene

Seek Out, a digital collage made by me. All artwork can be found at my Skewed North Souvenir shop.

P.S. Seven nights. Seven ancestors. One of them was my dad. What they told me is coming up this week in The Atlas.