Temma Ehrenfeld, Author at 1800Flowers Petal Talk

The Birthday Blues: What It Feels Like, Why We Experience It, and How to Get Through It

Gary spent his 48th birthday at work, hauling junk. He didn’t talk about the significance of the day with his work buddies — or anyone else, for that matter. In fact, Gary, who asked to keep his last name private, hasn’t celebrated a birthday in years.

Be sensitive and mindful of how other people experience their birthdays and what they might need during those times.

ash king

Psychologist and social media researcher

He dreads turning 50. “Fifty is holy Moses!” he says, “I still think I’m 25 in my head.”

Birthdays — and holidays — have made him sad ever since his mother died when he was 36. He misses her, and even more so on occasions when they would have been together. With each birthday, he also feels the weight of regrets and the mistakes he’s made in his work life. “I haven’t used my time well,” he confesses, adding, “but other people deal with worse.”

That’s true. “I have a number of close friends and family members who experience low mood on their birthdays,” says Ash King, a psychologist and social media researcher in Sydney. Feeling sad, self-critical, or regretful, as Gary does, isn’t uncommon. The “birthday blues” have many causes, and some of them have deep roots. Research even shows an uptick in suicides on birthdays among middle-aged men in the United Kingdom and in Japan, on milestones like turning 40.

Don’t assume you can jolly someone out of this state. A surprise party — or even an extravagant trip — can backfire. Instead, “be sensitive and mindful of how other people experience their birthdays and what they might need during those times,” King says. “I think we should follow our friends’ lead.”

That doesn’t always mean doing nothing — you might send a bouquet, plant, or card — but don’t push.

Are you depressed or suffering from anxiety?

Gary confesses he’s depressed, although he’s not in treatment. About 1 in 5 adults in the U.S. are diagnosed with depression in their lifetime, and many more live with symptoms — insomnia, low energy, aches and pains, lack of appetite or enthusiasm — without seeking medical care. Like Gary, they may try to ignore their birthdays to avoid a downward mood swing. Celebrations just aren’t in sync with their feelings. If you’re carrying around shame or guilt, feeling as if you don’t deserve gifts or attention is natural. If you are deeply sad or angry, putting on a gracious face for friends, coworkers, or family might just seem phony, or a burden.

Depression can also produce agitation, marked by fear rather than sadness. As Alexandra Koster writes in her 2022 article titled “Yes, There’s a Reason Why You Cry on Your Birthday Every Year,” “When my birthday approached, I found myself feeling uneasy and perpetually nauseous. I couldn’t leave the house without a pit in my stomach, and you could practically feel the anxiety living it up in the back of my throat. The idea of planning a birthday event was panic-attack-inducing.”

Jim White, a retired lawyer, says he conquered his birthday blues by “consciously evoking the presence of family members who are dear to me.”

Recalling your childhood or teen birthdays may help you understand or soothe your adult birthday blues. Gary remembers that his mother made an effort to make his childhood birthdays fun. “They weren’t so great — but she tried,” he says.

Jim White’s birthday was only a day apart from his father’s. “I kept wondering why he hated me,” says White, a retired lawyer. His father had had a hard childhood, and, White believes, he may have resented his more fortunate son. The memory of feeling resented, White suspects, was one reason his own birthdays were tough for decades.

For many people, the risk of rejection is overwhelming. Some traumatic associations are obvious: the unexpected breakup or a car crash after a drinking party that has poisoned all birthdays for you. Others are subtle and half forgotten. Maybe you noticed that other kids got fancier presents and understood that your family’s finances were shaky.

But even without depression or trauma, resisting the idea that you’re older is common. We watch people age in ways that cause pain to themselves and others, and we don’t want to follow in those footsteps. If unwrinkled skin and a full head of hair are important to your self-esteem, then every birthday feels like proof you’re becoming less attractive. Like Gary, you might be disappointed in your progress, wishing things had gone differently.

Deaths are linked to birthday blues

White, who turned 76 in October, began to feel especially bad around his birthdays in his 30s, after his father-in-law died young. His own mortality loomed: “I just came closer and closer to what I knew would eventually be my death. This was upsetting to me,” he says, “It isn’t so much now.” He worried that he wouldn’t be alive to help his friends and family as tragedies came their way.

Honoring the memory of loved ones has helped him feel better about his own birthday. For years, he sent his mother spring bouquets on her birthday, often through 1-800 Flowers.com. When she died, the next year he sent his sister tulips on her birthday, and he has kept up the tradition ever since.

By his 60s, White lost his birthday blues. People just kept dying — and he stopped fighting the idea. Instead, he reached out in his mind to his late grandmother and mother. “What made me feel better was very consciously evoking the presence of family members who are dear to me,” he says. When he turned 65, he gave himself a grand bash at a beloved church and established a fund in his mother’s name.

What you can do

birthday blues woman admiring flowers on bed

If you know someone who struggles with the birthday blues, you can show you care by remembering quirks and indulging them in quiet ways. For instance, if your sister loves peach cobbler, bring her one with a single candle and let her eat it later, alone. Or send her a simple bouquet. The key is that she can enjoy it privately, on her own schedule.

White’s wife and children always arranged low-key family celebrations for him, and his sister reciprocated his gifts, sending him autumnal arrangements. “Oh, they were wonderful,” he says. “They did make me feel better.” Eventually, she switched to sending him home-cooked hams, one of his favorite meals.

Ask about birthday memories, and let your friends and family tell you about the awful ones. If you’ve had your own bad birthdays, you can share that too. One option is to recognize a birthday, without too much fanfare, at another time. For example, you could arrange theater tickets on a date a month before or after a birthday and tell the recipient casually at the theater that the ticket is your birthday gift.

If you’re struggling with your own birthday, try to be proactive. Pull out a journal and write about why you’re feeling down, King suggests. But don’t use your journal as a way to beat yourself up. Instead, put your feelings into perspective with phrases like “Anyone would feel bad if…” Writing about emotional pain works best if you practice self-compassion. Also consider booking yourself a manicure or buying yourself a small treat, just in case it helps. And go ahead — tell friends that birthdays are difficult for you.

Birthday blues, on their own, are not an immediate cause for concern. They could, however, be a sign of a “deeper psychological issue,” including clinical depression, King notes. Along with feelings of “hopelessness, worthlessness, and despair,” the danger signs include an unrelenting low mood that lasts more than two weeks, with disrupted sleep and eating patterns. Any of these are cues to seek help.

Birthdays aren’t happy occasions for all of us. They can be painful reminders of the swiftly passing years, and can act as triggers for memories we’d rather forget. Remember that the next time yours, or that of someone you care about, rolls around, and to be kind to yourself, and others.

The Art of Floral Design: 9 Expert Flower Arranging Tips

Your tulips are bursting forth from the ground, or maybe your fall rose bushes are in full bloom. Of course, you want to capitalize on this sudden emergence of natural beauty springing up around you and snip a few choice blossoms to keep around the house. Or perhaps you’ve received several bouquets and want to create a combined look for your entryway. But you want to do your precious petals more justice then just throwing them in a vase and calling it good. So, how can you keep your floral cluster vibrant for a week or longer and make it a bit more eye-catching?

You’re ready to take flower arranging to heart. Betsy Karetnick, founder of The Portable Garden, has taught thousands of people how to arrange flowers, first hosting radio shows on SiriusXM for Martha Stewart and later joining Alice’s Table, where she hosts virtual workshops. (All Alice’s Table events include a kit so you can participate).

Here are nine of Karetnick’s best tips on how to create your own distinctive arrangements that will look beautiful in your home — and last.

1. Think ahead

Before you gather your flowers, think about the spots in your house where you want to add color or interest. Do you have an empty mantel? The height and shape of your arrangement will depend on placement. Also, consider the vases you’ll use, as that will dictate how many flowers you need.

2. Choose your palette

In a home with neutral colors, your floral palette options are as varied as nature. On the other hand, if certain colors stand out in your home décor, your flowers can enhance them. With a deep green velvet sofa, for example, you might choose light, pastel flowers to create contrast on a coffee table.

Complementary colors often work well, too. Remember that it’s not boring to stick with one color — red roses would complement your green couch. You might try several kinds of red flowers and play with texture. “It’s sometimes easier to pick flowers if you’re working monochromatically,” Karetnick says.

Now, looser-style arrangements that create balance are very in vogue.

betsy karetnick

Founder, The Portable Garden and Alice’s Table host

3. Know your vase

A classic cylinder vase with a thin neck is simplest. “I always say, try to keep the diameter of the vase a little bit smaller. It’ll save you money, because you’ll use less flowers, and it will save you angst, which is even better,” Karetnick advises. Square vases require more skill on the flower arranger’s part.

4. Give your blooms a bath

Skipping preparation is a common mistake. Your flowers need a bath when they arrive in your home. Well-hydrated flowers last longer. “When you get flowers, they’ve already traveled from somewhere, even from your own backyard,” Karetnick notes. They’ve begun to dry out, and the stem has formed a scab where it was cut. “A dry stem can’t drink,” she explains.

You may have heard the advice to cut at least a couple of inches from the stems, at an angle. This step allows the flowers to absorb water. For cutting, Karetnick recommends an ARS bypass shear. “You’ll buy one for your lifetime,” she says. The precise, sharp cut promotes hydration.

Florists often submerge all their flowers in a bucket and cut them under the water. Dilute flower food into the water and let the stems drink for at least an hour, or even overnight. Tap water is fine, as long as it’s room temperature. When you’re ready for flower arranging, use a new packet of food and water for the first day. “Once they’re really hydrated, they’re very forgiving,” she notes.

Roses and hydrangeas can be especially tricky and may need as much as 3 to 5 inches cut. For most arrangements, the water should fill at least two-thirds of the vase. For flowers with straw-type stems, such as tulips, use less water or the stem may disintegrate quicker.

5. Keep them hydrated

Water evaporates, so add new water daily. After two or three days, “I will take the flowers out and hold it like a bride bouquet. Swish off the container to clean it with fresh water, and add new room temperature water. I don’t add more food. And I will put the flowers back in and, if I have time, I’ll give them a quarter-inch snip at the bottom so they’re drinking with a fresh cut,” she says.

If you have tight blooms that haven’t yet opened fully — and some sunlight — you’re in luck. These blooms will flourish if you put them in last, higher up. In the next days, they should start to open.

6. Location, location, location

You knew where your vase would go — and now, with arrangement, you can make the most of that spot. On a side table or coffee table, aim for more width, roughly twice as wide as the vase. For a dinner table vase, put your elbow on the table and create a right angle. If your arrangement is below the top of your fingers, it will be below eye level and people can see each other across the table.

To add drama, put a tall vase in an entryway or a corner of a desk — but plan ahead when you are cutting the stems. In a 5-inch container, you need stems that are at least 7 inches long.

7. 360 degrees or front facing?

Keep in mind the angles from which your flowers will be seen. Turn the arrangement around as you work. If you are filling a spot against a wall or mantel, with a vase only visible from the front, use taller flowers in the back to create a cascading effect as the eye travels downward. In a front-facing arrangement, use fewer flowers. Good news: You might have enough for a second vase!

8. Aim for balance

A bouquet with one kind of flower can be lovely: No two flowers are alike. Put a bloom of similar size on both sides to create balance. But you can use as many as five or six varieties, creating balance by size and with color, using, for example, red flowers on each side.

Also balance by height. In a pavé arrangement, all the flower heads are close together at the same height, creating a “kind of carpet effect.” This is common in powder rooms or side tables because these arrangements are naturally lower. “It was very popular for a long time,” Karetnick notes. “Now, looser-style arrangements that create balance are very in vogue.” For a modern look, experiment by cutting stems to different lengths to create a sense of movement.

9. Try floral tape

This specially designed tape is an old florist trick — but be sure to get the waterproof kind. “Make a grid like a tic-tac-toe board but with smaller boxes,” Karetnick says. This will allow you to experiment, putting stems in and taking them out, and angling them so you can make a wider arrangement with fewer flowers. Secure the grid edges by wrapping the tape around the rim of the vase. Floral tape is “just terrific,” she says.

Whatever you decide, make sure you’re having fun. Your flowers are already perfect and beautiful; with arrangements, we’re only adding another touch. Enjoy.

How to Write a Limerick

There was an Old Man with a beard,

Who said, “It is just as I feared!—

⁠Two Owls and a Hen,⁠

Four Larks and a Wren,

Have all built their nests in my beard!”

– Edward Lear

Limericks are instantly recognizable; no one would ever think a limerick was a sonnet or haiku. Edward Lear, a British poet and artist who wrote and illustrated 109 limericks in The Book of Nonsense, published in 1846, said he was inspired by a nursery rhyme.

The rules of limericks are simple:

They have five lines.
Lines 1, 2, and 5 rhyme.
Lines 3 and 4 rhyme.
They have a distinctive rhythm (the technical term is metre).
That rhythm, known as “anapestic,” requires that 1, 2, and 5 have three strong syllables and 3 and 4 only two. But you don’t have to count; read limericks aloud and the rhythm will be in your head.

how to write a limerick with woman writing poetry

Limericks caught on and evolved

Lear didn’t invent limericks, or use the term, and we don’t know how they arose. One possibility is that the form developed as verses added to an Irish soldiers’ song, “Will You Come Up to Limerick?” (Limerick is a major city in Ireland.) By the end of the 1800s, important men of letters began showing off their limerick skills, and in the next century, magazines and companies were holding contests. Limericks were silly, bawdy, or super clever, as in this tongue twister:

A tutor who taught on the flute

Tried to teach two tooters to toot.

Said the two to the tutor,

“Is it harder to toot,

or to tutor two tooters to toot?”

Modern science or any topic can inspire a limerick, as in this mind bender:

There was a young woman named Bright,

Whose speed was much faster than light.

She set out one day,

In a relative way,

And returned on the previous night.

Or this lament:

I once fell in love with a blonde,

But found that she wasn’t so fond.

Of my pet turtle named Odle,

whom I’d taught how to Yodel,

So she dumped him outside in the pond.

Notice that one-syllable words are more common in limericks, but a rhyme involving more than one syllable makes it funnier (Odle and Yodle), and you can make up a word for your purpose (such as Odle.)

This is a famous example of that method, by the Tennessee poet Dixon Lanier Merritt:

A wonderful bird is the pelican,

His bill holds more than his belican.

He can take in his beak

Enough food for a week,

But I’m damned if I see how the helican.”

It’s hard to resist a smile at these. The form is inherently silly. In fact, writing a sad limerick would be a major achievement.

How to get started writing limericks

As writers and poets get their inspiration in different ways, and from different places, there is no one-size-fits-all method for crafting a limerick.

If you’re feeling like giving it a go for St. Patrick’s Day, or any time of year, here are eight ideas for getting that quintain down on paper.

how to write a limerick with person writing poetry

Start with “There once was an Old Man with a beard.” Enter “beard” into an online rhyme program, such as RhymeZone or Rhyme Finder. Choose two words that rhyme with “beard.” Contemplate a story involving those three words. Find a rhyme pair for the middle. When the answer comes, you should feel a satisfying “click.”
For the advanced class, do this with multi-syllable words. Ideally, all the syllables will rhyme, but you can get away with rhyming only the last syllable. The aforementioned rhyming websites will give you lots of options.
Think of a funny place name, such as Why (Arizona) or Kill (Ireland), and start with “There once was a sly guy from Why.” Any extra rhymes, such as sly, guy, and Why here, make it funnier.
Think of a favorite joke and apply the limerick format. Let it evolve.
Think of five lines from a pop song you absolutely hate and ridicule them as a limerick.
Take sad lines from a song or poem and watch them turn funny as a limerick.
As you settle in to sleep, tell yourself you’ll wake up with a limerick.
Look up limericks online and memorize one or two. Go to sleep. When you wake up, you might remember them incorrectly and be on your way to a new one.

Arise at sunrise and drink a lime rickey. Fancy yourself a limericker. Be tricky!

The Benefits of Friendship

Nearly every day I speak with my friend James White, who patiently listens to me kvetch.

Jim, who I’ve known for about 15 years, rarely tells me of his troubles. But he is a fountain of puns, and I’m the one who never groans. I giggle, chuckle, and roar with laughter at his words. The pleasure I receive, as he says, “reinforces everything that’s most important to me. To be enjoyed is to be validated.”

“Many people can be happy single, and families often live far away. But it is hard to be happy without friends.

Lisa Cohen

Licensed clinical psychologist

At 75, he is articulating what teens and twenty-somethings know: We need people who “get us” to feel authentic.

“Friends help us figure out who we are, and they make us healthier both mentally and physically,” writes Marisa Franco, psychologist and author of “Platonic: How the Science of Attachment Can Help You Make—And Keep—Friends.”

I don’t date much and barely notice Valentine’s Day. But I’ve already started scrolling for witticisms to send Jim on Palentine’s Day (it’s Feb. 13, the day before the more widely recognized holiday), and chortling as I scroll or chat on the phone sweetens many afternoons.

Friendship is necessary for optimal health

Science has established the benefits of connection in multiple ways, with big data sets and longitudinal studies over decades, and tools like biosensors and brain scans.

Good relationships are linked to longer lives. A trailblazing 2010 meta-analysis, followed up with research on more than 3.4 million people, concluded that meaningful relationships boost survival rates by 50%. Isolation, it revealed, is about as dangerous as alcoholism or smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

Similarly, a famous study tracking Harvard graduates from the classes of 1939 to 1944 concluded that strong relationships are the key to a long, healthy, happy life — and having happy friends nearby is especially helpful. A friend who lives within a mile who becomes happy increases the probability that you will be happy by 25%, according to the Framingham Heart Study, which followed more than 4,700 adults for 20 years.

Feeling heard even helps keep us sharp. In a study published in 2021, researchers compared brain scans of more than 2,000 adults over a four-year period to scores on cognitive tests. Respondents who answered positively to the question “Can you count on anyone to listen to you when you need to talk?” did better on cognitive tests than their brain scans would predict. “Supportive listening was associated with cognitive resilience,” the researchers said.

The need for people is hardwired

Isolation and loneliness are both detrimental to our health. An underlying cause of this may be unhealthy levels of inflammation. In effect, feeling too alone makes our bodies react as if we have the flu or another illness.

Why might this be? In the early days of humanity, being alone on the savanna, say, put you at risk of attack. As infants, we can’t survive alone. Now, our bodies react to disconnection as if we’ve been abandoned — or are sick or running from a lion — and over time the stress wears us down. In the groundbreaking 2008 book “Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection,” psychologist John Cacioppo described outfitting volunteers with beepers that prompted them to answer about their sense of connection while biosensors at their hips measured their heart responses. Lonely people had more measurable stress in this and later research tracking the levels of the stress hormone cortisol.

Isolation and loneliness raise the risk of high blood pressure, heart disease, obesity, alcohol abuse, smoking, sleep issues, suicide, and weakened immunity. Your perception of support and contact with friends may have as much effect on your aging as your body mass index, one study found. The quality of a tie matters, too: Stress in friendship is linked with chronic health problems as we age.

friendship benefits with friends holding flowers

The science is also quite clear that romantic relationships or marriages are not substitutes for friendship. The idea that intimacy with one person can keep you from ever feeling lonely is a mistruth.

“We can have many friends, and many different kinds of friends,” notes psychologist Lisa Cohen, author of “The Handy Psychology Answer Book.” “Many people can be happy single, and families often live far away. But it is hard to be happy without friends.”

Celebrate friendship

In the NBC hit comedy “Parks and Recreation,” Leslie Knope, played by Amy Poehler, and her gal pals leave the men at home and gather at a restaurant for “Galentine’s Day.” She gives each friend a gift bag that includes hand-crocheted items, mosaic portraits made from the crushed bottles of their favorite diet soda, and a 5,000-word essay about their magnificence. To amuse the crowd, she tells the story of a summer romance. The point is clear: He’s not there, and they are.

Palentine’s Day (same day, just a different name) includes men and nonbinary folk as well.

Gift ideas for Palentine’s Day

Rose Gift Basket — Girls Night In Rosé Gift Basket

keepsake candle — Friendship Keepsake Candle

Widen your circle

Loneliness can make us doubt our charm. If reading about the benefits of friendship inspires fear — “Nobody likes me, and now it’s going to destroy my health as well!” — then take a deep breath. You can boost your friendship skills. To assess your strengths and areas for improvement, you might try Franco’s questionnaire.

Franco has gathered together science-based secrets to expanding your social circle as an adult and healing loneliness. Here are four of them.

Reach out to an old friend. Research suggests that people will be more receptive to your overture more than you’d think. In general, we tend to think other people have enough friends, when that’s often not true.
Ask friends to create group gatherings or put you in touch with someone with whom they think you would gel. We’re less lonely when we share friends.
Put a connection into a new context. Invite a neighbor or coworker to play pickleball, for example. The more contexts you share, the deeper the friendship.
Act in ways that demonstrate to new people that you already like them. Nobody wants to risk rejection. Applaud them. As Oscar Wilde wrote, “Anybody can sympathize with the sufferings of a friend, but it requires a very fine nature to sympathize with a friend’s success.”

My own tip: Don’t worry about age differences. Several of my friends are more than a decade older than me, and I also have friends decades younger. And don’t use age as an excuse; making friends as you get older may seem daunting, but with the right approach, you can find meaningful connection.

friendship benefits with Temma and Boe Meyerson — The author (left) and her friend, Boe Meyerson.

Be willing to reach out

Perhaps you can put all these tips together with a Palentine Day’s celebration. Invite old friends and ask them to bring another person. Also include neighbors, coworkers, or people you met volunteering. In your invitations, don’t be shy about saying in, one way or another, I like you. You might emulate Leslie Knope and give your attendees a gift: a plant, plush bear, mini cupcakes, or pink roses. Spending money on other people actually boosts happiness more than treating yourself.

My book group has a tradition modeled on Secret Santa: Once a year, we each bring a wrapped book from our own collection. When we’re gathered, we have a system to randomly, anonymously distribute the gifts. I once received a book brought by a woman I didn’t know well. That started a conversation, and I invited her to another gathering.

Years later, the pandemic forced her to move away. She has three small children and a demanding job, so I assumed she didn’t have a moment to spare. But when I sent her an email, she quickly wrote back a generous reply, saying “I love hearing from you. Write any time.” It felt so lovely to hear that from her.