Living with a Cursed Birthday
They all seemed to suck until one sucked the most and changed how I feel about my birthday
A small, elvin child swings from the iron trellis on the front porch of her home. The afternoon is as perfect as early summer afternoons can be.
The sun shines brightly in the sky, far from the horizon.
The grass is freshly cut.
A gentle breeze rustles the nearly florescent leaves on a tall oak tree that shades a group of children, sporting party hats and holding little hug fruit barrel drinks in their sweaty, dirt-covered hands.
They are laughing, running in circles, sloshing the sugary drink on their shorts and legs. The tiny child watches the children while she climbs the trellis higher and higher. Her long, dark hair is held in pigtails. She wears a conical-shaped hat. A chin strap secures the flimsy paperboard to her head.
The children pay no attention to the climber, but her mother does.
The mother moves her eyes frantically from the group of children to the sprite scaling the porch of her house. She races toward her child, arms out, prepared to pull her off of the trellis before it is too late. But, it is too late. Her daughter stretches an…
