as always rewatching the southern air temple has gotten me back in my aang feelings. this go around it's literally just. his age. like his actual, biological age. aang was frozen at twelve and however-much, and he's not exactly going to coincidentally reemerge on the exact same day a hundred years into the future. he's going to turn thirteen on a completely different date than he turned twelve. he doesn't get to keep anything from his life before the iceberg.
the one silver lining, i suppose, is that aang may not celebrate his birthday or even care about the date at all, since to my understanding (disclaimer, white) in many east asian cultures, you are born one year old and legally age a year on the new year rather than on your birth date. and in buddhism specifically your own birthday isn't really an occasion. so if he marks the occasion at all, it could still be on the same day it was a hundred years ago. but regardless of all of that, aang is still biologically displaced from time just as much as he is mentally and. ough. agh.
