I take birthdays seriously.

I wake up with a strange feeling on friend's birthdays, especially when they live elsewhere. On their birthday, absent friends get on my mind like that thing you walked from the bedroom to the kitchen to get and then promptly forgot. Sometimes it takes me most of the day to figure out where that feeling is coming from, but usually the birthday person's countenance will come floating to my brain and I will think of the date and say, aha, the feeling has an origin. I am starting to think of this feeling as the Observation of the Missing Celebration; a day that should be and yet is not a celebration in your life. Like the experience of being in another country on the 4th of July. You're walking around missing things you generally don't need or want- missing fireworks, hot dogs, beer, Lays potato chips- with a vengeance.
So, happy 25th birthday to Myla, who is somewhere in Utah(?)!

A Birthday Poem
by Ted Kooser

Just past dawn, the sun stands
with its heavy red head
in a black stanchion of trees,
waiting for someone to come
with his bucket
for the foamy white light,
and then a long day in the pasture.
I too spend my days grazing,
feasting on every green moment
till darkness calls,
and with the others
I walk away into the night,
swinging the little tin bell
of my name.

...also, speaking of birth, how wild is this?

From Ireland On-Line:

After a decade parents discover babies switched at birth
10/01/2006 - 13:13:29

Two babies born on the same day in the same hospital in Thailand were accidentally switched at birth, but nobody knew about it for a decade.

The parents of the children, now 10 years old, learned last month they had been raising children that biologically were not theirs, doctors said today.

Doctors at the hospital in the southern Thai province of Trang where the children were born said it was still a mystery how the mix-up occurred, but noted that the pair shared certain traits.

“They were (born) in the same room, had the same weight, and were delivered at the same time,” said Sinchai Rongdet, the current director of Yantakhao Hospital where both babies were delivered. “The only difference is their gender.”

Doctors typically tell a mother her baby’s sex as soon as the child is born and tag the baby’s wrist with his or her particulars.

The children – Orawan Chanthong, the girl, and, Cherawut Bunyu, the boy – grew up in neighbouring villages and went to the same school.

Neighbours constantly told the parents that their children bore close resemblance to the other child’s family.

To end nagging curiosity, the parents and children went for DNA tests, Sinchai said.

“DNA tests confirmed that the children were switched,” he said, adding that the families have not yet decided how to handle the news.

A senior Health Ministry official, Prat Bunyawongwirot, said the ministry was investigating the incident and assigning psychologists to speak with both children.