Graceful

I have never written a post directly on my blog but I am doing it now. I know I have grown a year older today; as my friends wished me to have all my wishes come true in a healthy, long life, I couldn't help feel a little sad as well. It is not that I am unhappy that I am growing old. The feeling I am getting is something like a grace you feel in the face of a morning sun, or the tears you feel welled up in your eyes in an audience of a high lama. 

Last year I chose not to display my birthday in my Facebook profile thinking that it actually burdens people to wish me even though more than half of them didn't remember it or didn't care. But I changed that later because I realized that it actually gives my friends a reason to contact me, at least on this day and it is in fact nice to hear from them, even if it is superficial. And who doesn't like hearing from their friends? It also has a positive psychological effect on me. It makes me feel that my friends have cared to say something to me, on my birthday. But, I must confess that it may not be the day I was born. From an account of what I heard from my cousin, it seems like I was born in December, and not in August. But, it hasn't mattered to me much. I have always taken it to be the real one and thus am psychologically attached as well. Anyway, in my times and before, most parents were uneducated and they didn't keep record of when their children were born. At the most, they knew the month they were born in, in the Bhutanese calendar and it didn't always translate to the same month in the western calendar, which is used during the time of enrollment in school. 

Those of you who have wished me today, please don't feel wasted. I have always taken this day to thank for my birth, health, family and every other joy in life. And even if I do find that I was born way apart from this month and day, I will still take this day more seriously, because it is the day I always celebrated. 

Thank you everyone. When there are people wishing you good things to come in all the days to come, growing old just seems like another joyful step in life. I cherish for having come across each one of you.