I turned 19 in level 4 lockdown, and regardless of the lockdown, celebrating my birthday is labour in itself. Lockdown just made it even more so. I don’t find joy in my birthday but others do so I take part in it and thought that it would make my friends and whÄnau happy to see me taking part in it during level 4. Thus I went out to my local park and sat there with my tiny cake and my candles, I placed the flowers my partner had given me on top and documented it.
Whilst it looks nice (which was the point to please everyone else), I felt miserable on this day, taking this image. My birthday is a day in which I have a ton of emotional baggage I have to hold and for me, that’s labour. I always am on the edge of my seat stressed out, and I was in this moment even more so surrounded by people not wearing masks or social distancing. But, it was definitely better than celebrating on my bathroom floor. (The only place I could light candles where the fire alarm doesn’t go off.)
Here are the candles and the cake that I had purchased that are shown on my recepits from previous blog posts. Also, the flowers my partner had picked for me to try and lighten the day a bit, take less of the labour out of celebrating my birthday.
