My sisters and I birthed seven babies in five years and all of their birthdays are in May, June, and July. In the before times, birthday season was glorious. If there’s one thing my family excels at, it’s birthdays. I come from a long line of birthday enthusiasts. We celebrate the crap out of birthdays. The nibling birthdays have always been chaotic, exuberant, messy days full of cake and togetherness and unbridled joy.

And then 2020 hit and birthday season was cancelled.

We did manage to have one one family day in late August. We gathered outside in a park and celebrated all of the birthdays and it was great. One of my favourite days of 2020 (which isn’t saying a lot, I know). But it wasn’t the same. Next year will be different, we said. I’m not sure we really believed it but it was nice to hope.

Yesterday was the first of the nibling birthdays. We did not have a birthday party. We ate cake and ice cream on a family Zoom meeting. We stared at our loved ones’ faces on a computer screen and sang Happy Birthday and then, after we logged off, we cried. Or, I cried. Poppy yelled - at everyone and everything - and Grady got very quiet and very stoic. We will do this six more times over the next twelve weeks. I hate it so much and I’m so grateful for the privilege.