Recently I’ve been giving some thought to the subject of birthdays; the primary reason was that I was approaching the birthday where you hear from our government about your new health coverage and the direct monthly deposit of S***** S******* checks. I knew I was about to arrive at that station in life’s journey – I’d begun to laminate membership cards and the like and realized that an interest in lamination is an indication of some Impending significant shift.
This was not a birthday to look forward to, either for chronological or attitudinal reasons: I don’t like getting old, at least by other people’s definition, and I think age depends much more on attitude than mere counting like growth rings on a tree.
In my youth, there were birthday parties, or so I have been told. They were fun, full of candles and cake, and I have learned that I enjoyed myself at these events. It may be true, but I don’t remember, to be honest about it.
On my 21st birthday, after I had righted myself following an academic misadventure, my mother presented me with an envelope, more in it than a card….cash, perhaps?
No, it was nothing that trivial. Inside were a pair of apron strings – honest to God, cut apron strings. I was on my own, trembling but - at last.
The next birthday I remember was my 50th, when Karen persuaded me to go on a breakfast picnic, followed by, perhaps a dog show in Saint Paul, and a visit to her Mother who was in the hospital after hip surgery.
Controlling person that I am, I had invited a small group to the house, cooked the chicken in advance, and by mid-afternoon, I had to get home. Running so late, that I didn’t have time to get ice to keep the beer cold, I came down the road vexed, no, frustrated.
When we turned into the driveway, there were all kinds of friends from the worlds I’ve inhabited, meandering about, a tent had been erected, a whole pig was being roasted, musicians were playing Swedish music, and I was embarrassed at how easily fooled I had been, angry at the same thing, and amazed that such a conspiracy had been cooked up by several friends months in advance, and I hadn’t gotten wind of it, not even a slight rustling of the leaves. In spite of all, to be cosseted in that way was, ulitimately, a delight.
And with that birthday, I declared an end to such celebrations – please. OK, send me the cards with really old guys in wheelchairs, with walking sticks, no teeth…even the one I got this year with a man in his hospital gown lying face down on a gurney in the company of a nurse and doctor who are looking at the patient’s fanny from which is…well, let me paraphrase the punch line by the nurse, “He says the instructions on the tube are to squeeze from the bottom.” I laughed and laughed, until I opened the next card which was identical to the first. Then I began to wonder, not about my friends and relations, but about me.
This year I wiggled and feinted and managed to have my birthday at home with Karen; we explored some of the finest from my favorite Scottish distillery, and it made for a fine celebration.
I still don’t like, in the words of Curt Gowdy, once a broadcaster of The Boston Red Sox, to be thought of as “rounding third and heading for home,” in spite of the stark reality which the obituary pages display every day.
There is a business to run, a house to be managed, remodeling projects to be worked on, trips to be taken, genealogies to be updated, a basement to be organized.
No more birthday celebrations, no retirement in view, just a modest change in gears.
If I’m careening toward the abyss, I would like to be driving a clown car, with a bunch of my pals jammed in along side me, telling wonderfully raunchy stories as we go – good friends and good fun, that’s the gear for m
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