What I Am Thinking When I Wish You Happy Birthday on Facebook

I celebrated a birthday earlier this month. My family took me out to dinner. I got phone calls and cards. My friends at school got me lots of chocolate! It is always nice to be celebrated. I deeply appreciated how people made my birthday special.

The icing on my birthday cake were the nice greetings on Facebook. They are short, for the most part, and simple –and that is fine.  As I wrote a while ago, I enjoy getting birthday greetings on Facebook. It feels good that people thought about me and are wishing me well. Each morning, I do the same and write a birthday greeting for my Facebook friends. If I have a good picture, I might include that, too.

The truth is that my greetings, and most Facebook birthday greetings, are brief and superficial. Some of my younger Facebook friends send each other elaborate photo collages, embarrassing SnapChat captures, or long missives of devotion, but these seem to be exceptions rather than rules.

Like many people, I don’t have enough time to write a long letter to all of my friends having a birthday. Some are more acquaintances and I am not sure what I would say.

So here is what is going through my mind when I wish you happy birthday on Facebook:

Happy birthday to you! I hope today provides you an opportunity to be celebrated and fêted. I hope that, whatever your birthday wishes are, you are able to make them come true.

I am so glad that your birthday gives me a chance to communicate directly with you! Seeing your photos, liking your posts, hearing about your adventures keeps me connected to you, and I like that. If we haven’t talked in a while, know that miss that part of our friendship.  

I cannot overstate how wonderful it is to hear about your graduations, vacations, jobs, weddings, family, special events, interests, and thoughts. When I read them, I hear them in your voice, and for a while, across the distances and years, it feels like we are together.

Know that thinking of you brought me joy. Know that, although I may not have photographs of all of our shared memories, our past is very much on my mind as I write these quick little words to you. Know that I am honored to be a friend, Facebook or otherwise. Know that, although you may have several hundred (or thousand) such friends, that does not diminish the value of our relationship in any way to me.

I worry about writing the wrong thing for your birthday, so I keep it simple and standard. If I have a good picture, I might share it. If I don’t share it on this birthday, I will try to share it in the future. But when I do share it, I will worry that you won’t like the picture. If you don’t like the picture I shared, go ahead and delete it or tell me to do so. I won’t mind. I am sharing it because I don’t remember if I showed it to you before. Now you saw it.

If you wrote me a birthday greeting, thank you. If you did not, that is okay, too. Some of us don’t do that. Some of us don’t use Facebook that way. No judgment there. Don’t worry about it –and certainly no guilt, please! There is enough of that off of Facebook.

So may this be the best year ever. May this year bring you and those for whom you care health, happiness, purpose, and goodness.

And may we do it all again next year!

Live Long and Prosper,

David

Letting Go of the School Year

People ask me if the school year is winding down. My school year never seems to slowly come to a gentle stop. It feels more like a roller coasts that twists and drops and then, with a jolt, stops suddenly right where I got on.

May and June are intense, packed, and stressful. As the weather gets more pleasant outside, it becomes more difficult to remain inside. The rooms feel stuffy, and the end of the year can’t get here soon enough.

My calendar fills up with year-end events, banquets, and graduations. Some students just can’t hold it together any longer: some seniors struggle to get to the finish line; some freshmen can’t juggle one more assignment. We have another family crisis, spring case of mono, and all that prom-a (prom drama).

And like a bad tease, summer dangles before us.

On top of it is the reality of letting go. Sometimes, seniors can become quite difficult at the end of the year. They find fault in everything. They instigate disagreements. Pleasing them can be impossible! They are making it okay to say goodbye. If high school was really that irritating and unhappy (even if it wasn’t), then it is time to leave. If everything “sucks,” then it is less painful and scary to cross that stage, accept the diploma, and step out into the great unknown. The process of leaving is new and kids don’t always know how to handle that mixture of emotions.

Teachers don’t either. I should be good at this by now. I remind myself not to miss my students until they are actually gone. I bring my camera to school a little more often. I relish the conferences where I can tell my students how wonderful they are and thank them for putting up with me.

I am happy for them at graduation. I love the handshakes and hugs afterward. I am so grateful for those who connect on Facebook or in other ways as a means to stay in touch. I don’t want to let go. I joke about finding a teacher who will fail them so they will have to stay for another year.

That is what the end of the year means. It is not just about seniors. It means letting go of our yesterday selves. It means acknowledging the passage of days. Time passes quickly but that doesn’t just mean we’re having fun. We can’t go back and, even when kids insist they can’t wait for the year to end, the present is safe, known, and comfortable. Tomorrow, whether in a new place or a new year, is unknown and a scary.

When I come back to school in the fall, I have a period of adjustment when I mourn my classes from the prior year. I don’t know my new students well. I am excited to learn about them and with them, but there is a little shock, as I enter a classroom, and I wonder who these strangers are and where is MY class?

Sometime in October, I will turn a corner and see a student I haven’t seen since June and it is as if I have been given a gift. This meeting will soothe an anxiety that I wasn’t aware was sitting in the background.

Starting a new school year takes energy and work. Finishing one is like cashing out an investment. We have our routine. We know each other well. Yes, maybe we are now a little sick of each other. Yes, maybe things have lost their shine. But all my hard work is paying off! The growth is now visible!  Do I have to let it go and start over again?

That is the beauty and the burden of the educational cycle. It affords us time to reflect, relax, and then do it again a little better and a little differently. It is time to meet some new friends and be reborn.

Graduation is an end. The last weeks of school are chaotic and stressful, summer is a time to recover and rejuvenate, and then we do it again – hopefully better. And we miss those who are not doing it with us this time around.