Memories of Summer Birthdays

When I was growing up, July and August were filled with family birthdays. We had no sooner put away the shirt and tie boxes from Father’s Day, when my grandmother’s birthday arrived on July 7, my dad’s on July 10, my best friend’s on July 18, my grandfather’s on July 27, my mother’s on Aug. 2 and finally my great-aunt’s on Aug. 15. My husband shares my dad's July 10 birthday, and my mother-in-law's was July 24. And we always celebrated with cards and presents, photographs, and ice cream and cake. It was a thing. The fact that I can remember those dates shows how important they were at the time.

In those days, you had to be present with other people to really celebrate. There were no charming videos to send to someone’s social media page. You shopped for gifts, had a special dinner--usually at home--and there was a cake and candles and singing no matter how old you were. We had a chair in our living room called the “posing chair” because whoever was celebrating was expected to sit in that chair with a gift in their lap (and a cocktail in their hand if they were adults) and have their picture taken by my dad. And if it was my dad’s turn, he always looked rather intense because he was too busy telling my mother how to take the picture.

Sometimes I think we’ve lost the ability to celebrate, and I’ll admit, I’m as guilty of it as anyone else. When birthdays roll around, I’m kind of like, “Meh, I don’t want anything. Too busy, have a concert that night. Here’s a card. Let’s go out to dinner—whatever.” My husband and I certainly don’t need to add more stuff to our closets, and since we don’t have younger folks in our family, there’s just no reason for a lot of hoop-la. But it’s the spirit that I miss—the effort to find something the other person would like (in an actual store!) and the excitement of carrying a candlelit cake to the table and watching someone close their eyes and make a wish.

And those celebrations, simple and corny as they were, created lasting memories. One year, we put those candles that don’t go out on my aunt’s cake, and they scared her so much she made us bury them in the backyard. On my grandfather’s last birthday when he turned 75, my grandmother baked a crystal stopper from a wine decanter into the middle of the cake so it would look like a diamond. She was so proud of that, and I can remember my grandfather, who was not well at the time, offering her a weak smile and asking me to help him blow out the candles. My best friend’s mother would make this incredible German Chocolate cake with big fat homemade layers smothered in thick icing studded with coconut and pecans. I can still taste it to this day.

I know, we’re living in a far different world and, when it comes to birthdays, most of us of a certain age are sort of over it. We worry about all these things we can’t or shouldn’t eat. We proclaim that we’re downsizing and decluttering and make valiant statements about choosing experiences over material objects. Yep, all good. I get it and mostly agree. But we’re missing out on yet another way of connecting with each other, of telling family members and friends that one day a year they’re special and worth a little extra effort. That they’re deserving of a chance to make a wish over a cake glowing with candles surrounded by the faces of people who love them.