Five Tiny Birthday Stories
The Field Trip Report No. 2
The Field Trip Report
Welcome to the second Field Trip Report! Because it isn’t a field trip without a writing assignment.
Inspired by the New York Times Tiny Love Stories, this week we’re talking about birthdays in 100 words or less.
I love my birthday. It’s my personal Christmas, the day I get the two things I crave most in this world — Costco’s All American Chocolate Cake, and attention.
My parents always made birthdays special, inadvertently setting me up for future adult disappointment. The day always revolved around food. Chorizo for breakfast, Dunkin Donut munchkins as the class treat, chicken and rice for dinner, and the long-anticipated cake. Living abroad means I can’t rely on familiar food to distract me from the annual existential dread. Despite this, I am reminded every year that I am loved. And that satisfies any craving.
External validation and consumption aside, birthdays should be a day to celebrate our existence. Dr Seuss said it best:
“I am what I am! That’s a great thing to be! If I say so myself, Happy Birthday to me!”
This month’s talented authors were among the first people I ever “met” on Substack, and I treasure the parasocial friendships that have grown on this app. Check out their pages, and I promise that you will have the best birthday of your life this year. I’ll put in a good word with your mom.
Riana | Teaspoon of Adventure - writes about slow travelling through Europe with her husband, baby and dog. A travel blog for people wanting just a little bit of adventure. (Follow her Notes if you want to be hungry literally all the freaking time, seriously, some of the best food documentation I’ve ever seen)
Olivia Wickstrom - an American living in France, bestselling Substack coach helping others to romanticise the everyday and embrace their main character energy. (Follow her for transparent, genuinely helpful advice and motivation)
Michael Verdoni - accountant, poet, writer and friend, working to unscramble his brain. (Follow for deep, thoughtful essays from a feminist and a scholar)
Emily davis - journalist and poet writing on faith, friendship, and the peculiarities of life. (Follow for vivid descriptions, off-brand experiences in the wild, and a hype woman)
Marina Mofford - a New York mom writing honest takes on parenting in the Big Apple (Follow for extremely relatable experiences as a mom, and also to live vicariously as a chic NY mama)
Best Birthday Surprise
For my daughter’s first birthday, we gathered around the table at our Airbnb in Spain, ready to FaceTime my dad in Toronto so we could all sing “Happy Birthday” together.
Only, my dad was MIA.
We kept delaying, but eventually, we had to cut the cake without him. I was fuming. How could he miss his first grandchild’s first birthday?
30 minutes too late, he called.
“I’m sitting at Charles de Gaulle. I was supposed to be in Spain but my flight got delayed. I’ll be there in a few hours.”
Best birthday surprise ever. - Riana | Teaspoon of Adventure
Belly Button Birthday
I got sober one week before my twenty-seventh birthday. In recovery, we call your sober date your “birthday” and your actual birthday your “belly button birthday.” So, for the past five years, these two celebrations have sat back-to-back: June 17th and June 23rd.
My sober birthday hits different. It’s the truer measure of time — not just another year older, but another year of actually having my sh*t together. Emotional stability. Relational maturity. The kind of growing up that only happens when you stop running from yourself.
So yeah, I have two birthdays now... but only one feels worth celebrating. - Olivia Wickstrom
Golden Birthday
I was born on Halloween, which meant two things. First, for the early years of my life, I was terrified of my birthday. Why are there scary monsters and sexy trees everywhere??? Second, because the holiday is so busy, I never really celebrated on the day itself, which led to my not caring much about my birthday at all.
Zoe, my wife, loves birthdays - hers, others’, it doesn’t matter. Through continued patience and effort, she’s changed how I think about celebrating myself, and with my Golden Birthday this year, it feels like the perfect time to really do it. - Michael Verdoni
Queen Carolena
Adults do not un-invite people to birthday parties enough. Children un-invite with reckless abandon. I know this because I was once a child, uninvited to Carolena’s 8th birthday. Devastating! In hindsight, I deserved it. I was being unkind. Bullies do not belong at any party. As an adult, I’m too nice. Everyone’s at my party! Even the bullies! Eating my cake! Even falling in love! And love is great, but they don’t love me, and I don’t like them. Time to go back to my roots and borrow some of Carolena’s courage. I will be uninviting people to my 29th party. - Emily davis
Blurry Birthday
I woke up a year older, like my own personal daylight savings, except my clock was turned a year ahead. I nursed my baby, then my husband took her to change her diaper so I could ease into the morning. I put my contacts in and noticed my prescription needs updating. I can mostly see but some things are blurry. I also have floaters now. I thought those came at forty. I’m only thirty-six. We bundle our baby and leash the dog for a walk to our regular coffee shop. Our barista rings up our order and zeroes it out. “These are on me today. Happy birthday.” - Marina Mofford
Thank you for reading! Don’t forget to check out and subscribe to these writers (best birthday gift ever). Have a favorite birthday story, or want to write the next in the next Report? Comment or message me.
This was so fun to read others' stories, and thank you thank you for the feature!
Such a FUN read!