The Birthday Dinner

I watched my marriage crumble over Chinese food and it hurt my feelings.

(Quick note: If you enjoy this post, please feel free to ♥️ it! It’s clearest way to tell me that you like it, and clear communication is key….)

Last week, my tiny little baby husband turned 38 years old. This is the twelfth year we’ve celebrated his birthday as a couple. Can you believe I knew him back before his brain was fully formed? Back when he could still qualify as a dependent on his parents’ health insurance instead of as a dependent on mine? Back in that long forgotten era when we could both sleep as much as we wanted on the weekends, but chose not to because “being awake” seemed like more fun? Time certainly flies when you’re living through the end of democracy/the birth and tyrannical reign of two male heirs. As birthdays and Father’s Days and anniversaries come and go, it’s hard to know how to keep your declarations of love and enthusiasm for your partner fresh. Especially with the demands of early parenthood grinding you both into dust. Most of the time, you’re slapping together romance with the paltry tools you’ve got. Instead of “I love you’s” you wipe your newly potty-trained toddler’s butt so your husband won’t have to. Instead of expensive gifts, you let him sleep in while you try to teach yourself and your five-year-old how to play Pokemon GreninjaEx from YouTube videos, even though it was your husband who bought the cards in the first place. Obviously. You would never bring that trash into your home. And yet, your devotion to the man you married runs so deep, here you are at 6:30am, learning how to play a game that has been in the zeitgeist since your own childhood and not for one single second piqued your interest.

This is a Smoliv Pokemon. He sprays fluid.

As any associate of a parent to small children knows, we think what we’re going through is much harder than whatever you are going through and are constantly using our kids as human shields to excuse our bad behavior. No one can be mad at me for breaking plans, or not returning calls, or forgetting the names of people I’ve met at least three children’s birthday parties. I have two small kids! But there’s one person who you simply cannot in good conscience ask to accept your get-out-of-jail-free-because-I-have-kids card. You cannot pull that shit with your partner, the very human who is shouldering the other half of the load for the same exact children. If you want them to show up for you on special occasions like birthdays or anniversaries or social situations you really want to flake on but can’t, you must show up for them. And I want my husband to show up for me. If he didn’t, it would hurt my feelings. I assume. So far in these last twelve years, it’s either never come to that, or I’ve repressed it because have a virtuous husband makes me feel superior.

And yet, this year, I dropped the ball. Or at least, I kind of dropped the ball. (Did I mention I sometimes have trouble taking accountability? I have two small kids, cut me some fucking slack!) I planned a dinner out with some dear friends for the night before my husband’s birthday. I wanted to make it the night of his ACTUAL birthday, but these dear friends also have two small children, and are constantly pulling their kid card on me before I can pull it on them. When I informed my husband of our plans, he tried to make clear in the completely veiled and indirect way to which I’ve become accustomed that he actually did not want to go to this restaurant. It was too far away. It was too expensive. He really didn’t care about celebrating his birthday. But I wasn’t buying it. See, when two conflict-avoidant, passive-aggressive people fall in love, it’s hard to know when your partner actually doesn’t want something, and when you’re being tested. I am, and have always been, an extrinsically motivated student. I refuse to fail a test. But as the date of our dinner drew closer, I began to worry, does he think I’m not canceling the dinner because I want to go, and not because I want HIM to go? After all, to be completely transparent, I wanted to go! The restaurant was owned by one of my favorite Top Chefs! I wanted to get away from my kids for a night! I wanted to forget we don’t have money by spending money we don’t have! But I wanted all this for HIM too! (And also me.) In the silence between us whenever our dinner plans came up, I felt my motivation being questioned, and it hurt my feelings. So I didn’t cancel the dinner. I felt like I was playing chicken. If he had actual wants, I figured, he was going to have to use the very direct words want or don’t want to express them. He didn’t. We went to dinner. We ate delicious food. It was fun to see our friends. We had a good time. But still, I felt like I’d made a mistake.

I’d been loosening my grip on the ball. But the next day, my husband’s official birthday, I actually dropped it. At the grocery store, my older son and I picked out cards for him. But I never got around to writing mine. Get him a present? Surely he wouldn’t want me wasting more money, after how offensive he found the dinner bill. I even had the nerve to tell him, “I was going to get you a Trader Joe’s cake, but they didn’t have the kind you like.” What a pathetic version of a loving gesture. Despite what you may have heard, it’s not the thought that counts. It’s the cake that counts. If the day before his birthday I’d upset him by doing too much, the day of his birthday I doubled down by doing too little. Is this the kind of silent violence all couples engage in, or am I just a bad person?

The cake I would have gotten my husband if it was available.

Entering day three of our marital cold war — his birthday now a thousand years behind us according to toddler time — things were still tense. What’s wrong? I asked, both knowing and not knowing. After all, how can two people truly understand each other when they’re communicating entirely through understoods? Finally, after a lot of prodding, he confessed, “I didn’t realize we weren’t doing anything to acknowledge birthdays anymore, not like, with a card or anything.” As soon as he said it, I realized how stupid I’d been acting. That’s always the nicest part of these important days, isn’t it? To have someone remind you that they find you smart and funny and creative and hot, even after twelve birthdays together? I’d been hungry for directness from my husband, while failing to offer the same directness in return. I felt terrible. I went to my room and wrote a card, the gesture surely cheapened because it took him reminding me, but still, I needed to do it. I wanted to do it. There are many ways to say I love you: butt-wipings, late mornings, fancy dinners. But sometimes the best way to say it is with words.

Also, maybe he DID directly say he didn’t want to go to dinner? Shit.