Some people hate birthdays. They don\u2019t want to\nhear about them. They refuse to tell you their age, or even discuss such\nmatters. What\u2019s that about? Other people are different about such things. I am\none of those.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When we were kids, birthdays were all about\ncelebrations. There was the cake, the gaudier the better. And the presents!\nDidn\u2019t we look forward to all that? There was all the fuss about getting\nfriends to attend. And even hard feelings if someone you thought was a friend\ndidn\u2019t attend. Parents got into it and it could get all political. The \u201ckeeping\nup with the Joneses\u201d adage raised its ugly head and your party had to be as\nspectacular as those of your friends. I remember once we had a small pony to\nride at a birthday. Some kids had a clown come to entertain the kids at their\nparty. When we were teens, they were just an excuse for a dance, with all the\nto-ing and fro-ing between girls and boys. And getting money from the relatives\nso we could add to the bank account for college was a very serious business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In our parenting years, it was more about the\nkids. Birthdays, if they were marked at all, were something quiet between\nparental partners. At least, that\u2019s the way it was for me. There had to be a\nspecial something between the partners for fuss to be made on birthday\noccasions. Many years of our lives went by with no conscious notice taken to\nthe passage of time. All of a sudden we were at 20-year anniversaries. Pity!\nThere is a lot to be said for marking occasions with some ceremony. There were\na lot of occasions we missed that should have been celebrated. Too bad about\nthat as I look back. Maybe things were better for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I find things are so much different for me\nthese days. I try to linger consciously on the special events, the birthdays\nand other milestones as well. Like when we do yoga, we really concentrate on\nfeeling the now, our presence in the instant. Birthdays are great moments for\nthat. I track the dates and give advance notice to those who may have the\nfaintest of interest, sending out blindcopied email messages to all and sundry\nalerting them to the occasion, so they can jump on the computer, the telephone,\nor any other communication vehicle. They can pretend that they have known about\nthe matter all along, so the object of the interest will feel really\nappreciated. It helps draw all of us closer together, reinvigorating our ties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If we can be present for a birthday, that takes\nthe cake. Thinking of my own experience as the one being f\u00eated, don\u2019t we all\nfeel good when somebody makes a fuss over us, doing something that we wouldn\u2019t\nthink of doing for ourselves? After all, we usually think of others. We would\nfeel too self-absorbed, even conceited, to make a fuss about ourselves. It\u2019s so\nmuch nicer when somebody else goes to the trouble of doing it. Doesn\u2019t that\nmake us feel great! It does me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And, know a secret? I\u2019m no longer shy about\nthat stuff. I am totally obnoxious. I had a birthday when I was 75 and invited\neverybody I could think of, especially those I really wanted to see. And I made\nthem travel, hundreds, even thousands, of miles to attend. Of course, I\ninsisted I wanted no other present than their presence. (And I graciously\naccepted gifts from those who ignored my request.) All the cards and letters I\nreceived were great. And one of my daughters assembled a book of my poems, with\npictures and comments, that is among my treasures today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I held my 75th in my old hometown, thousands of\nmiles from where I lived. I went to a place where they had a chocolate fountain\nfor the kids. It was wonderful to see all those chocolatey faces. And my\nson-in-law stepped in and picked up the tab. Wow! What a gift! Yes, I remember,\nand am grateful. I would have been very happy to pick up the bill just the\nsame, but it makes one feel so appreciated. It was an orgy of\nself-satisfaction. Aren\u2019t I a brat! I know that. My Bride reminds me I am all\nthe time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I did the same thing for my 80th in Dublin,\nwhere my Bride and I were living at the time. I knew then that we would be\nleaving to come back to Canada, so it was a great occasion to invite a few thousand\nof my favourite people to say goodbye. A couple of my kids even came across the\nbig water to be there. It was another indulgence to my ego and I enjoyed it\nthoroughly. We only live once, right? We have to celebrate survival. We may not\nbe around too much longer to do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, I believe in indulging in all the things\nnow that I never gave a thought to during the years I was slugging it out,\nmaking my way through life. Many of us are too busy during those years putting\none foot in front of the other. When younger, we did things the quickest way,\nthe most economical way. We shrugged off the sentimentality we might have felt,\nthat might weaken our resolve to forge ahead. In doing so, we surrendered a lot\nof what might have been very good times, but we remember the few times we\nweakened, now some of the best of our memories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These days, I make a great fuss about every\nbirthday \u2013 even when it\u2019s not mine! <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Max Roytenberg<\/strong> is a\nVancouver-based poet, writer and blogger. His book <\/em>Hero in My Own Eyes:\nTripping a Life Fantastic is available from Amazon and other online\nbooksellers.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Some people hate birthdays. They don\u2019t want to hear about them. They refuse to tell you their age, or even discuss such matters. What\u2019s that about? Other people are different about such things. I am one of those. When we were kids, birthdays were all about celebrations. There was the cake, the gaudier the better. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[8243,8302,8664],"class_list":["post-31753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-op-ed","tag-birthdays","tag-lifestyle","tag-milestones"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31753"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31753\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}