Something-9

Today is my baby sister’s 29^th birthday. And in about a month, my second-eldest sister will turn 39.

And it makes me realise that women (men, too?) work so hard to avoid their 30^th and 40^th birthdays – well, most decade birthdays past 20 I imagine. But if you think about it, being 29 or 39 or 49 (etc) really sucks because no one will believe you. People think you’re a liar when you say you are something-9 years old.

Here’s how it works:

Someone says: “Hey! Happy birthday, Royann! How old are you today?”

She says: “I’m 29!”

And they think: “Yeah, yeah. 29 and holding… I wonder how many years she’s been 29!?”

And it works like that because people like our eldest sister (and others; please know this isn’t just a Cook Girl thing) claimed that she stopped ageing at 29. Yep, Veronica denied (with pride) turning 30 – and kept the 29 number going for a few years. Certainly, she knew that everyone knew she was lying, but it’s a socially acceptable lie so she kept telling it. (To confirm: She turned 40 last year. I don’t know if she has admitted that publicly or not, but it’s true.)

When I turned 29 I hated telling people how old I was. I hated it because I just know that people were thinking “Yeah, right!”. I was so relieved to be 30. (Which helped because I could have still passed as mid-to-late-20s if I wanted to.)

So poor Royann (29) and Claudia (nearly 39) will for the next year be thought of as liars when they tell someone how old they are. Bummer.

Even worse is knowing that I’ll have that agony soon, too. But I think that in two years when I’m meant to be turning 39, I’ll just skip that year and go straight to 40. Much easier that way I think.

Oh! And if you wondered, Celeste is now 35 and Jessica is now 33. I figure if I’m going to be in trouble for telling you how old some sisters are, I may as well jump fully into the flames with all of their ages!

But here’s the thing: Us Cook Girls are so incredibly beautiful and youthful-looking that if we admit our actual ages people will say: “Oh, my! You look so young! So beautiful. So youthful. I wish I could be as gorgeous as a Cook Girl!” (Or something like that…)

(Happy birthday, Royann! I really will believe you when you say you’re 29. Well, for the next year anyhow.)

[Photo credits to Royann.]