What's in a birthday?

Today, as of this writing, I turn 28 years old and three years past the point of a quarter-life crisis. I made a quick scan at the years that went by and I couldn't really say if I fell into that pit. Luckily enough, if I did, I was able to pull myself out alive. It's funny how at a very young age you start to question yourself, the meaning of life and of existence. I guess we were all designed to think that way, so much so that we start to do crazy stuff. Last year, I got two small colored tattoos. I have yet to figure out what I am to do next.

But seriously though, what is a birthday? Aside from the fact that it was on this day, on a specific year that you were born. It was probably the time when your parents have felt the most elated. I am not a parent myself but new media portrays childbirth as the spectacle of life. It is an art form crafted in the human body, that only the females would understand deeply. You celebrate, blow candles, and have the best day of your life.

I make a reference to my birthday because it somehow speaks also about the death of another year that has passed. Similarly enough, we will also die to the years of this administration and a new one will take over. Every proclamation day in an election year is considered their birthday, the day of birth into politics. Yet no one remembers those kinds of dates. They might count the years in service, but never commemorate a full year into service.

Why so? This is also the question I ask myself a million times. Could it just be plain engagement from the workload or that people don't really care? These are the small intricacies that we take for granted for every politician who is secured a seat because of votes. Once they get what they want after a circus-like campaign, they forget the people who placed them in position.

Coincidentally too, my birthday which falls on the third week of September is a signal that the dates for the filing of the certificate of candidacy nears. We are so much closer to choosing new leaders. The only contention is if there is indeed a choice among those who signified their intention to run.

True enough, there is so much to enjoy on one's birthday but the merriment does not go beyond what I could have. There are no under-the-table transactions in exchange for my personal agenda, no harmed individuals in the process and certainly no midnight appointments. As I grow older, I realize that you may make such an impression but never get to prove yourself, the same way goes with every politician who is now contemplating to grab a seat in whatever local unit, the Senate, or the presidency.