24HappyBirthdayJason_001

Happy Birthday, Jason

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This is a companion piece, to “Happy Birthday, Jay“.

I’ve never really been a big fan of birthdays, even when I was little. They were hyped as Your Special Day, but they never lived up to that, either because they were ordinary, or sometimes I just had a lousy day, as often happened. On top of that, birthday parties were always a stressful combo platter of “who will show up” and “how fun was it”.

Birthdays were a little more fun with Jay, because we were both mature enough not to idealize them. Being able to do something nice for someone is one of the great things about being in a relationship. But there was still some pressure to make them Your Special Day. Sometimes, one or the other of us managed to pull that off. :)

Of course you reach the point where birthdays are just another reminder of how old you’re getting, and that really isn’t much fun. That’s one of the reasons why I don’t have my birthday posted for public consumption on Facebook: getting a bunch of computer-prompted “happy birthday” greetings (or worse, not getting them) is more annoying for me than anything else. Yeah: humbug. For the record: I planned to post this piece in timing with my birthday. But today isn’t it.

And finally, birthdays end up as a reminder of milestones that you don’t get to celebrate. This year would’ve been one of those for Jay, which is why I’ve been focusing on him the past few weeks. I miss you, my love. You made me a better person, and I wish that was still true.


A “meta” comment about doing this piece:

Originally, I drew Jay and Daniel (that’s his name) naked. I mean, why not? They kinda should be, right? But it occurred to me that some might read the scene as Jason catching Daniel and Jay in bed together (figuratively, not just literally), and think that Jay’s covering that by pretending it’s a birthday surprise. (But that’s a whole different Tale.) So I figured that undies would be appropriate.