I'm another year older now, as you may have heard. Middle age, as Cordelia said, is a sort of movable feast: it always extends about ten years beyond where you currently are. But I'm definitely in the midst of middle age: will celebrate by doing something drastic to my hair, next week.

To my surprise, and for the second year running, many of my fandom friends remembered my birthday with kind wishes, posts, and even music uploads, drabbles, or stories. I posted a list thanking them all on my other blog. And then I sat back and looked at it. Good God.

No one celebrates birthdays like LJ fen, it seems. Normally, my husband and best friend remember, and that's about it. That always seemed quite normal, since a Jan. 6th birthday quite naturally gets swallowed up by Christmas. But the last two years, my birthday has also acquired a . . . virtual dimension.

And I suspect that this isn't entirely about me. Because it's not just me. I see many people on LJ whose birthdays are celebrated again and again on my flist. Sometimes, a friend even creates a special comm for the flist of the birthday girl to post stories, art, and good wishes in.

There are several things going on here that I want to tease out. Because this is a combination of fannish potlatch and epistolary romance. Plus, aspects predicated on the virtual nature of many fannish relationships.

( Potlatch celebrations. Birthdays and holidays among LJ fen )