The Birthday Festival

Grandkid birthdays are sprinkled through my calendar year like confetti. Those falling in February, March, October, and November transform ordinary days into parties that I revel in right along with the honoree.

But when the other two birthdays fall only five days apart during the last week of June, those call for a festival. We have barely licked up the last crumb of Zoomie's cake when a whole new one pops out of the oven for Sooby.

Turning nine years old today, Sooby celebrates a milestone. She begins the last year she will write her age with a single digit. She stands poised between the relative ease of the primary grades and the more rigorous expectations that come with fourth grade.

As the first grandchild, Sooby is something of a milestone herself. She was the first one to call me "Googie," and she started the avalanche of delight that became six grandchildren born in six years. Together, they have equipped my early retirement years with diapers, booster seats, sippy cups, extra toothbrushes, Legos, coloring books, Barbies--and the list goes on.

I won't get to see Sooby today, but I got to spend this past weekend with her, Zoomie, and their other siblings as their mama rehearsed and sang in concert with a professional choral group. Zoomie's birthday fell during our trip, calling for presents, a visit to Cici's Pizza, and a Funfetti birthday cake served in our hotel room.

While Mama rehearsed, the five of us kids did McDonald's twice, Orange Leaf Frozen Yogurt once, a hands-on science center for kids, Finding Dory, and a nice park complete with ducks, geese, and fish. The weekend had all the characteristics of any self-respecting birthday festival. Because of it, I think we will always remember the year Zoomie turned four and Sooby turned nine.

Happy Birthday today, sweet girl. I hope you like the new Spirograph from Pa-pa and me. I know you won't always be as carefree as you look atop this carousel pony at the state fair last summer, but I wish you the happiest of days today, and I can't wait for the phone call that will tell me all about it.

It was great being with you the day you reached the four-year mark, little guy. I love this picture of you blowing bubbles so seriously and intently on Mother's Day. Guard that giant jar of gourmet jelly beans Mama got you for your birthday, and don't forget to share some with your brother and sisters. Maybe you will still have some left next time I come to visit.

Every birthday I get to spend with a grandkid is a treasure to cherish. I reflect on weekends like this one just past and realize once more that I am rich indeed.

The Seventh Daughter

I can't imagine what the couple must have thought when, on Nov. 22, 1924, their seventh daughter came into the world.  With a houseful of girls already ranging in age from sixteen down to two, was there disappointment?  Was there resignation?  Was there joy?

Story and song give us fascinating accounts of the psychic powers sometimes attributed to seventh sons. Just ask Johnny Rivers, because after all, as the song goes, "[He's] the one, [he's] the one," you know.  Is there any witchcraft or voodoo attached to a seventh daughter?

No--not this one, anyway.  She had what must have been a pretty uneventful childhood; at least, she doesn't recall much of it.  She grew up and came of age, it seems, pretty much spoiled by her older sisters and their husbands.

Of course, she was of that generation that walked miles to school in all kinds of weather.  This, she remembers.  She went on to graduate salutatorian of her high school class, marry her high school sweetheart, and become a stay-at-home mom before it was really a choice.

She stretched her own curtains.  She never drove a car.  Every Monday she ran clothes through an old Maytag wringer and, when she was done, carried the water out to the back yard a bucketful at a time.

Her birthday is noteworthy for numerous reasons.  Over the years, it has occasionally fallen on Thanksgiving Day, as it did last year.  Fifty years ago today, on her thirty-ninth birthday, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.  There was cake that day anyway.

Today she turned eighty-nine.  She is mother to two, grandmother to four, and great-grandmother to eight. Her youngest great-grandson came not quite three weeks ago, and she was one of the first to welcome him.

Happy Birthday, Mom.  You and Heero are like bookends, framing our month of November with your birthdays and giving us two great reasons to celebrate.

I don't know what your mom and dad thought when you were born.   I never got to ask them.  But I, for one, am glad they had Daughter #7--and I know a whole slew of little rug rats who would be quick to agree.