I'm sitting here writing this article, watching the time tick closer to midnight. One hour and thirty-three minutes until I turn 24. And, for the first time in my life, I'm not sure I'm excited about that.

Every year, my birthday was akin to a national holiday. I would run around the house, telling anyone who would listen that today, x years ago, I was born. I would joke that, for the month of August, I should get to pick dinner or not do any chores because it was my birth month. But this year, something feels...different.

My parents did all they could to make my birthdays special. I have fond memories of shopping for Harry Potter themed party plates or Mom taking me to Kroger to let me pick out my cake. I would have friends come over and we would play outside or watch scary movies. Even as I got older, my birthday was still a special day in my eyes. I would ask off for work and chastise my parents when they didn't do the same. Since my birthday is in August, I never had to worry about going to school on that day. This may have contributed to the over-glorification of my birthday. Looking back, I see that this is an extremely spoiled point of view.

As my birthday draws nearer (one hour and fifteen minutes), I ask myself, "Where did the warm fuzzy feeling go?" Should I attribute it to the fact that I will be one year older, thus one year closer to death? Or maybe it's because I'm becoming more mature? Or maybe it's because I did this very same thing last year? Whatever the reason, it just doesn't feel the same.

Growing up is hard. No one handed me adulthood on a silver platter and said "Here ya go, kid." And I think to some extent, birthdays reinforce that idea. With each candle added to the cake comes a new responsibility. First it's things like making your own doctors' appointments, then it's waking up to a crying baby at 3:00 a.m. Before you know it, you have two mortgages to pay off and fifty candles on your cake.

�This year, my new full-time job will keep me from dedicating the entire day to myself. I will go to work, come home, watch a movie with the family, eat applesauce cake and go to bed. As if it were a normal day. And I'm OK with that. The pomp and circumstance doesn't feel necessary anymore. Checking Facebook every hour to see who wished me a "Happy Birthday!" isn't the monumental event it was a few years ago. What will matter is that I've been around another year. I've been able to spend that time with family and friends. And in this year, I have given and received copious amounts of love. This year, I get to look around and wish for it all again.

Happy birthday to me.