I Like My Birthday
I don't know if it's cool to say, but I like my birthday.
I had one on Monday, which feels fitting, given what I write about every week. It was a great day. I like hearing from friends I haven't talked to in a minute. I like the cards from my kids and my husband. I even like the reminder that the number keeps going up, because it means the window for all the things I want to do is now.
Liking yourself out loud feels vaguely against the rules. Which is why I've been thinking about Dolly Parton.
With her passing, you could feel the heavy hearts everywhere. She's synonymous with love, strength, generosity, rhinestones. It's hard to find anyone who'd argue she was anything but beloved.
But there's a clip going around from 1977, her interview with Barbara Walters. Walters tells her she doesn't have to dress the way she does, and asks whether people would call her a hillbilly. Watching it now feels absurd.
Dolly's answer: “I'm very real where it counts, and that's inside… I am sure of myself as a person. I am sure of my talent. I like the kind of person that I am.”
Even Dolly had haters. On national television. And if she had them, why in the world would I expect not to?
Treating haters as an inevitability takes the sting (and the power) out. Disapproval stops being a verdict.
And notice what Dolly didn't do. She didn't fire back. She answered with self-knowledge. She knew exactly what she was doing, and she kept doing it, in wigs and heels, for fifty more years, until the world came around to her. Not the other way around.
So yes, I like my birthday. And I'm working on liking the person having it, out loud, no matter who's grading.