It’s said that a long time ago at Easter, someone important was resurrected by an immense power.

I can confirm that this year, that event will happen once again.

I am an April baby and will be celebrating my 28th birthday on the preceding Saturday, and on Easter Sunday, I will be resurrected from a deathly hangover by the immense power of Berocca.

There’s nothing like a birthday to make you reflect on the relentless, slow-creeping avalanche of time.

One minute, you're 21 and thriving; next, you're googling ‘why do my knees sound like popcorn when I walk upstairs?’ And your idea of a wild night is eating dinner after 8pm.

Birthdays are time’s way of tapping you on the shoulder and whispering: ‘Hey... remember all those goals you said you'd achieve by now?’

Yes, we remember.

Somewhere between the glow of candles and the gentle panic of realising another year has vanished like your metabolism, we all ask ourselves: ‘Where did the time go?’ (Hint: mostly scrolling. So much scrolling.)

And yet, despite the existential spiral they occasionally trigger, birthdays are kind of wonderful.

Free desserts, funky hats, and the annual opportunity to post a photo captioned ‘another trip around the sun’ as if you personally powered the rotation of the Earth.

They’re a little checkpoint in the marathon of life — a brief pause where you’re reminded people like you enough to give you socks and baked goods.

If that’s not worth celebrating, I don’t know what is. This month, reflecting on the upcoming and previous birthdays, and other events of my life, inspired my poem.

So, cheers to birthdays: proof that time is passing, but so is that plate of cake, so it’s all good.

quantification

28 birthdays

27 bags for life

26 parking tickets

25 paralysing hangovers

24 viewings of the Lord of the Rings trilogy (extended editions)

23 kilos lost

22 hobbies started and abandoned

21 tequila slammers

20 experimental hairstyles

19 therapy sessions

18 music gigs

17 kilos gained

16 kitchen gadgets

15 novels by Dickens read

14 tax returns submitted

13 years of education

12 subscriptions

11 Taylor Swift albums

10 countries

9 regretted decisions

8 piercings

7 jobs

6 kitchen fires

5 cars

4 break ups

3 breakdowns

2 deaths

1 life