Collateral Damage: Let Them Eat Cake

There were enough breaks in the clouds to remind us there could be sun. Rain didn’t fall as much as spurt from the sky, intermittently, and with little power behind it. But it was enough to soak the picnic benches, prompting several of us to muscle the tables further under the shelter and away from the fireplace where Josh built a fire. Lush green grass and blooming trees aside, you’d never have guessed it was April in Atlanta.

In my usual state of rebellion, I’d worn flip-flops under my blue jeans and hoodie. Within minutes of arriving, I was grateful I listened when a voice of reason couched in loving kindness urged me to throw a pair of shoes in the car “just in case”. It was tricky business switching out my footwear without getting my socks wet, but I managed. As I perched inside the door on the backseat of my car, a steady stream of soggy guests passed on the other side.

By the time I emerged, the party was well under way. A large, multi-colored balloon bouquet swayed languidly over a chocolate birthday cake. The smell of grilling meat billowed from a flume on one side of the grill, an array of chips and desserts filled one of the tables, and a football sailed, occasionally, over the heads of laughing children. Hoods were on heads, hands were in pockets, and breath floated like conversation bubbles over the heads of guests, happy to see each other. Things would have been very nearly perfect if only Trey could have been there. For the second time, we celebrated his birth after his death.

In the days leading up to the party, I marveled at how well I was handling things. There had been no crying jags or heavy sighs. I wasn’t sleeping particularly well but, as a woman of a certain age, there were any number of possible explanations for that.

And then, someone mentioned ketchup. Which made me think of mustard. Which made me think of mayonnaise, and cheese, and relish, and trash bags, and streamers, and noise-makers, and all the other incidentals that would normally come without thinking when planning a birthday cook-out. Except that nothing was normal. Normal hadn’t happened yet. Perhaps it never will. And, if it ever does, it won’t be on that day. That day, Trey’s birthday, will never be normal again.

I didn’t realize until I got there how much I hadn’t wanted to come, or how little I’d done to prepare. Luckily a store down the street stocked most of what I’d forgotten and, by the time the burgers were done, we had everything we needed.

People attended the party for different reasons. Some, like me, came out of a sense of obligation. Some came to celebrate the life of a friend. At least one came for the company, and a few came for the food. I realized though, as I looked over the crowd, that despite our personal motivations, we were all there for the same reason.

We were collateral damage.

81

My Dad will be 81 today. He made his yearly trek up from the gulf coast to Atlanta yesterday, and you can write his departure date on your calendar in ink. He’ll leave the day after Father’s Day. His work here will be done. It’s a pretty sweet deal, really; a few hours driving nets him 8 days of pampering, multiple trips to his favorite restaurants, two parties in his honor, and many, many kisses.

He’s never been easy to buy for, mainly because he’s always had the means to buy for himself. My youngest sister buys him clothes. They’re always expensive. They’re always sporty, and they’re always the right size. This is because she has a hand in buying all his clothes. Since it’s his birthday, these clothes will be wrapped in tissue paper inside a box. If he likes them, he’ll say they’re “sharp”. Sometimes they’re even “really sharp”. And, if he likes them a lot, he’ll call someone’s attention to them as in, “Stacye! Look at this! Isn’t this sharp?”

My sister Laura gives him English Leather after shave. She always has. Ever since we were very young, and our parents took us to Rich’s downtown, to the floor where the ladies wearing lots of make-up and really high heels asked us how much money we had, and helped us pick out something to give Mom and Dad at Christmas. I don’t know where she gets it now. I can’t remember the last time I saw that familiar cedar rectangle on display inside a store. Maybe she gets it on the internet. You can buy anything on the internet…

My sister, Holly, and I are, depending on your particular brand of pop-psychology, the Free Spirits, the Rebels, the Scapegoats, and/or Rabble-Rousers in this family. You never know what we might present come gift time. Holly has gone the clothing route; a bold move, in my opinion, given her competition. For a couple of years, she gifted him with coffee. Dad prefers Starbucks, House Blend, please…ground, not bean.

Being the artsy-fartsy one of the bunch, I crafted calendars for Dad. Much to the chagrin of almost everyone present, I named myself “Family Photog”, and set about chronicling our events. Only the best of the bunch graced Dad’s wall. Best, of course, meant lots of things. It might mean cutest, or most comical, or heartwarming, or pretty, and sometimes it just meant the only shot I got in which my sister’s eyes weren’t closed, or my nephew’s mouth wasn’t open. I never knew how much he appreciated my efforts until I didn’t make them any more. He called me, during a time free of family emergency, just to express his disappointment. Of course, he had his calendar in a matter of days.

And he’ll get his calendar this year too…only it’ll be on Father’s Day, not on his birthday…just to change things up. I’m using old black-and-whites of my mother. I’m sure he’ll love it. In the meantime, I went to the Farmer’s Market and bought all the things he likes.

I bought “Sundried Tomatoes Pesto”. I’m sure the label was printed by the same woman manning the booth. She urged me, in her gorgeous Italian accent, to try the vegetable medley. I demurred, explaining the purchase was for my father. “He’ll be 81 tomorrow.” She smiled through her disappointment.

I bought a pint-sized almond pound cake from a teenager, who will never know it was the beautiful crevasse atop the loaf that sold me.

I bought smoky chipotle salsa from a woman more interested in her cellphone than selling salsa. There was either a child or man on the other end of that phone. I know. I’ve been there. I bought anyway. Still, she was disappointed I didn’t try the empanada.

The woman selling spiced pecans was a newbie. She hawked her wares from a cookie sheet while her son quoted prices in whispers. I bought a small, over-priced baggie-ful. Dad loves pecans.

The pièce de résistance appeared, where it always does; on the last row, in the last booth. “Heavenly Pastries” is owned by Tanya Jackson who almost certainly works for someone else most of the time. When she’s not, though, she creates perfection in the form of miniature glazed bundt cakes drizzled in chocolate. I bought the Red Velvet. She included a gingham gift bag with my purchase that I’ve decided to use as wrapping in place of the basket I’d pictured filling earlier.

My stopping excited her. She stood immediately. My choosing the cake excited her even more.

“It’s for my father.”

Her smile grew.

“He’s going to be 81 tomorrow. He doesn’t come to Farmer’s Markets so I’m buying all the things I think he’ll like.”.

She counted my change into my out-stretched hand.

“Tell him I said “Happy Birthday, okay?”

Birthday Boys

Looking back, I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have shared a pregnancy with than my friend, Dottie. She uses her grown-up name now. Everyone calls her Dot. But, I knew her when. I’ll always call her Dottie.

From the time we met, we shared lots of things. We shared stories and dreams and worries and fears. When Dottie had to pull (This would be the literal “pull”, not the figurative one.) her husband out of a local bar, I kept the baby. When my son dropped a crystal ashtray on his sister’s head, I called Dottie’s Dad for help. When Dottie’s mother held a Tupperware Party, she knew she could count on me to be there, and when the Datsun pick-up I’d paid $300.00 for wouldn’t start, Dottie gave me the keys to her Pontiac land-yacht.

I was pregnant with my third child. Dottie was carrying number four. We scheduled our prenatal appointments for the same time when we could. Rather than separate exam rooms, the clinic was comprised of one very wide corridor divided into curtained sections just big enough for the midwife, the exam table, and the stirrups. Were it not for those women wearing stethoscopes around their necks, one might have thought they had stumbled into the changing room at a maternity clothing store.

I was instructed to take off my “bottoms” and “hop up on the table” (This would be the figurative “hop”, not the literal one.) while the midwife called on Dottie who waited two curtains away. Resting my hands atop my mountainous abdomen, I tried not to eavesdrop until the words “no heartbeat”, at which point I stopped breathing in an effort to hear every word. My own heart raced as they scheduled the ultrasound that would reveal whether or not Dottie’s baby was alive. And when it came time for my exam, I both wished the midwife would hurry, and wondered how wrong it would be to ask questions. Dottie hadn’t asked many. It was as though she knew.

Her baby was fine, and mine was, too. They arrived just a month apart. Dottie’s son, Carey, was born in April, and my son, Josh, in May.

Three years later, I gave birth to a second son. He split the boy’s birthdays, arriving two weeks after Carey’s and two weeks before Josh’s. For the last twenty-nine years, April has been a time of celebration that began at Easter and ended , appropriately, with Mother’s Day.

Dottie lives in South Georgia now. She might say she could see Jekyll Island from her kitchen window, but that would be because she was trying to convince me to visit, not because she actually could see it. I’ve seen her just once in over ten years.

I did see Carey recently. He’s very tall and looks very much like his father. He celebrated his twenty-ninth birthday a couple of weeks ago, which means Trey’s birthday is this week…Saturday, to be exact.

Only Trey isn’t here to celebrate.

It hasn’t exactly sneaked up on me. It occurred to me in early March, just as it has for the last twenty-six years. It was just a few days after Trey’s memorial service. I hadn’t gone back to work yet. Josh was here and so was Jennifer. We talked about it. We planned it. Somewhere deep down I knew we had to.

And now I don’t want to. I don’t want to the way a toddler doesn’t want green beans. I want to scream. I want to cry. I want to scream while I cry and then I’ll stomp my feet and no matter what you say I won’t go. I won’t!

Because, he’s not here.

People say things like “He’s not gone. He’s always with you.”

No he’s not. He’s not here because I can’t hug him or smell him or hear him call me “Ma”. I never understood why he did that. No one else ever called me that, just him. He always called me “Ma”. And now no one ever will again.

Who will blow out the candles?

To Bake, Or Not to Bake

So, apparently, The Rapture is scheduled to take place tomorrow, May 21^st. Or October 21^st. Or, possibly some time in between. I guess that’s why, though he announced a date, Reverend Camping left us guessing as to time.

And, that’s unfortunate.

You see, it’s clean-up day at the high school tomorrow. All football players and their parents are expected to attend. I suppose we could blow it off. I mean, it’s not as though they’ll be taking attendance, right? But there’s this feeling that if you don’t show up, the coach will notice. You’d be passing up an opportunity for face time, a chance to make an impression so indelible as to create a presence he won’t be able to ignore while fine-tuning the starting line-up. Yes, there is the perception that a day like tomorrow could make or break a kid’s high school football career, rapture notwithstanding.

I spoke with my grandson yesterday. He finished the conversation the same way he always does.

“When am I coming to your house, Nonni?

Had Reverend Camping seen fit to settle on a time, I might have planned a short visit. I could have arranged a sort of Bon Voyage party, just in case. I mean, granted, Elijah probably hasn’t been born again, but that could be because it hasn’t been an awfully long time since he was born the first time. Surely the selection committee wouldn’t hold that against him, right?

My son’s birthday is Monday, and he really, really wants to be fourteen. After all, he’s had a whole year to plan. In anticipation of the event, I purchased a pretty fancy guitar. It’d be a shame if he never got to play it, but I could probably get my money back. There are sure to be plenty of guitar players left behind…

And, of course, a pending rapture calls into question the need for cake. To bake, or not to bake? The cake my son has requested is, when complete, three layers of decadent gooey goodness. The ingredients aren’t cheap and preparation takes some time; time possibly better spent on “making arrangements”, if you catch my drift…

On the way to dinner tonight, my son gave a lecture on rapture. His knowledge was impressive considering his formal religious education is spotty, at best.

“The whole thing is bogus, Mom. I mean, anybody who reads the Bible knows that even predicting the rapture is a sin! Nobody’s supposed to know when that’s going to happen!”

This is the point at which I realized my son has been receiving Bible lessons from someone other than me. We’ve discussed God, rehashed stories, investigated traditions, and read many of the Psalms. I love the Psalms. David is among my favorite poets. But we only discussed Rapture once. I remember we were watching VH1….

>Collateral Damage

I’ve never given much thought to birthdays. They come, they go, I mark them in the usual way. I pay little attention to the numbers that go with them. One year in fact, after expressing surprised delight at all the celebratory gestures that shouldn’t, after this many birthdays have been much of a surprise at all, I realized with genuine amazement that I was a year younger than I had thought for the entire preceding year.

This past August though, as my birthday drew near, I felt something nag at me. I studied myself in a mirror. I searched every tiny crevice time has stamped upon my face, but the answer wasn’t there. Long ago I realized there are good days and there are bad days. On good days, the lines are there, I just don’t notice them.

Was I worried about being attractive to men? After all, as a late bloomer, I had a short window. I tried to remember the last time I stopped a car, or just caused one to slow down. It seemed it had been a while. There was a time in my late thirties and early forties when I could still attract a man eligible for coverage under his parent’s insurance policy. Those are generally the ones who stop. After all, it’s easier to hang your head out the window and/or yell “Baby” over the din of Atlanta traffic if you stop the car first.

Then I remembered a day not so long ago when it rained, as per usual, during rush hour. About half my drive is bumper-to-bumper, and on this particular day the two men in the front seat of the car to my left seemed determined to get my attention. There’s a certain look in a man’s eyes when he’s hoping to catch yours. These guys had probably switched insurance companies a number of times. They may have even added dependents. That’s okay. They still had eyes. It felt good. Some days, I’ve still got it.

I am bothered by a sudden sense of the finite, the certainty that you’re over halfway through, the knowledge that there’s less left than you’ve already lived. It’s as though one day you think, as you have for the preceding decades, “I’ll get to it.”, and the next you wistfully wish you had.

And then it hit me. It wasn’t about me. It’s about them, the people who pepper my life; the ones who listen, the ones who’ve been there, the ones who know me and love me anyway. Because, I’m not the only one getting older.

One of my closest friends is eighty-six. She still works three days a week and puts dinner on the table for her husband every night at seven PM; not six, not seven-thirty, always seven PM. Four times a year, she drives her 1996 Toyota Corolla over 200 miles, alone, to see her daughter in Tennessee. She is blessed with a sharp mind, a keen wit, and a nose for good perfume. But…realistically..for how long?

Another friend is sixty-five. We joked, for years, that she was old enough to be my mother. She loves to eat, she loves to read, and she loves her grandchildren. Despite medication, her blood pressure often peaks to stroke level, and a valve in her heart isn’t working. She should have surgery but she already owes the cardiologist money she’ll never be able to pay. Sometimes she doesn’t hear the ring on her new smartphone which she describes as “good for everything but making telephone calls”. When she doesn’t answer, my first instinct is to joke with her about it. But what if it isn’t a joke? What if she doesn’t answer because she can’t and never will? I don’t leave a message. I call back later.

I resent having to think about these things. It’s one thing to face my eventual demise. I can put that away. When it pops to the surface I can push it down with a sense of purpose. After all, I’m healthy. I’m active. I’m doing the things I can to prevent the outcomes I dread.

But, I can’t do that with the others. The folds around my friend’s seawater-green eyes remind me. The sound of exertion as she painfully plods towards the entrance to the grocery store worries me. The certainty that one day they won’t be there saddens me.

So I do the only thing I can do.

I love them.

Now.

Daddy’s Girl

My father fathered four females.

I am the eldest.

“My name is Stacye, and I’m a Daddy’s Girl.”

Of course I am. We all are. We have a Daddy…we are girls. And, like all good southern girls, we actually call him “Daddy”.

Addressing him that way comes naturally. Admitting to it conjures images of Orson Welles, syrup dripping from the corners of Joanne Woodward’s unlined mouth, and a discomfort that smells like warm gardenias.

By now, you have an image. My blonde hair is long, as are my legs. My eyes are large, and probably blue. There’s a natural curve to my lips, which are carefully painted pink; never red. And, you would be right.

Except, the image is that of my sister, my baby sister to be exact; the one who still throws her limbs on either side of his recliner as she sprawls across his lap, the one that bakes for him, calls him daily, and houses him when he leaves the crystal sands of his beloved beach for important family events, such as his birthday, Father’s Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.

But I was there in the early days…

On Saturdays, we logged hours in his two-toned El Camino, driving around town doing errands. His “Honey-Do” list became our “Trip for Two” list, as we traversed suburban side-roads between the post office, hardware store, garden nursery, and occasionally, the local mechanic.

Mostly, we talked.

“Never forget who you are!” I especially loved that one. “You’re a Howell!”

He said as though it meant something. He said it as though mere mention of our name was enough to garner the respect of anyone within hearing distance. He said it so often that I believed it.

He told me stories of him and Joe Wiggins. It was always “Joe Wiggins”, never just “Joe”. Perhaps there was another Joe. I don’t know, he never said. But, he never mentioned his childhood friend without inserting his surname.

I remember the sun being particularly bright one Saturday afternoon. We’d probably just dropped my car off…again. The dilapidated shop occupied most of a block-long side road. They specialized in foreign “jobs”, such as Hondas, Toyotas, Datsuns, and Cortinas. They didn’t actually specialize in Cortinas. No one did. Because, no one east of the Atlantic drove one…except me.

“Why don’t you divorce her?’ My right hand swept blonde wisps from my face. The air conditioner in the El Camino had stopped working weeks ago.

“Because Howells don’t divorce.” He said it as though it were true. He said it as though he was raised by two loving parents instead of a crotchety grandmother who insisted he sweep their dirt floor each morning before mounting the newspaper-laden bicycle he later rode to school.

And I believed, because I didn’t know.

He taught me about cars. He didn’t change his own oil. He had “Eddie, The Mechanic” to do that. But, he taught me to change mine.

He lay under the car, while I leaned across the engine. We changed the oil, added water to the battery, and checked all the other fluids. When we were done; large, continent-shaped swatches of my flannel shirt were missing.

“Battery acid.”, he said while ordering me inside to change my shirt with just a look.

But I kept it. I kept the shirt. I even wore it a few times. Now, I’m sure it lies alongside my holey Peter Frampton t-shirt; the one I kept for almost twenty years before deciding that I really never would wear it again.

But I will…

Angels will sing, harps will play, and there I’ll be…Daddy’s Girl…wearing a holey flannel shirt over a faded Peter Frampton t-shirt.

“Do you feel like I do?”

Frayed Strings

No one loves their children more than I do. My youngest is thirteen now, which only goes to prove that all the minutes I spent wishing he could be my baby forever were for naught. But I knew that…

To my credit, I’ve turned those mournful minutes into reasons to be grateful. When he recounts an exchange with another student in school, I pay attention. The day will come when sharing won’t be so easy. When he calls “Mom”, as I walk past his darkened room, I stop and listen before reminding him, again, to go to sleep. When he allows me to take his hand as we walk, I feel it as I hold it. And, when he wraps his arms around my waist, and rests his head against my chest I thank God for the blessing. Every little boy hug, every little boy kiss, could be the last.

He turned thirteen last week, three days before school let out for summer.

“Do you want a party? You could invite your friends from school, the guys from your baseball team, and some of your football friends. We could go to the park. You guys could play baseball, and we could cook-out.”

Shane sat silent, looking through the window to the backyard. Movement in his eyes told me he was considering the offer. He’d attended several birthday parties this year.

Valerie invited him to his first boy/girl, night-time party. There was dancing, which led to sweating, which provoked Shane to stealthily comb the health and beauty aids aisle during our next visit to the grocery store.

Chelsea’s mother went one better and rented a pool-side clubhouse. As we pulled up, the outer walls of the building seemed to vibrate in time with the disco ball sparkling through an upper-floor window. Expecting hesitation from Shane, I turned in my seat to offer words of encouragement from someone who has personally experienced countless disco balls. The backseat was empty, the car door slammed, and by the time I turned around Shane had mounted the walk towards the door without so much as a wave good-bye.

A pattern began to develop, and I saw my mistake.

“Oh…I just realized all the parties you’ve gone to this year were given by girls. Boys your age don’t have birthday parties, do they?”

Relief colored his face.

“Not really…”, he smiled, lowering his head.

“Ok! So what do you want to do? We could go out to dinner. Your choice! Or we could go to the movies. You could take a friend….You tell me. What do you want to do?”

“I want to spend the weekend with Josh.”

Josh is his oldest brother. He married just before Shane’s birthday. He and his wife live in a rural area seventy-five miles away.

Shane left on Friday.

Friday night I had dinner out, and for the first time in a long time, no one offered me a children’s menu. My companion and I enjoyed uninterrupted adult conversation. And when we left, there were no tell-tale crumbs beneath our table.

Saturday I slept in, and woke to a quiet house. I never realized how much noise is generated by the simple act of breathing until mine was the only breath drawn. I took my coffee to the patio and never felt compelled to grab at the table beside my chair in hopes of steadying it. Birdsong fell on my ears without accompaniment. No one asked me any questions.

I spent the rest of the day doing as I pleased. I shopped without uttering the word “no”. I turned my Ipod up as I gardened, never giving a thought to what might be going on inside the house. I gutted the playroom, and in so doing generated quite a pile for the next charity pick-up. He hasn’t touched those toys in years…

I organized his dresser, and added several threadbare t-shirts to the aforementioned pile. The one with the hole in the collar has bothered me for months.

I baked cookies for the neighbors and no one whined, “You always make the good stuff for other people!” I watched tennis on TV without giving advance warning of an imminent takeover of the den. Music wafted from speakers mounted beneath the eaves as we grilled on the patio and no one asked me sardonically, “Why don’t you like rock music anymore?”

As I turned out the lights above the mantle and closed the sunroom door against the night I thought, “So this is what it will be like when he is gone. I can do this…”

The phone rang and I jumped to answer it.

“Hello?!”, I never gave a thought to sounding casual.

“Hey, Mom.”

Those two words began tales of Clydesdale horses, front flips from diving boards, and a dog Shane loved enough to bring home.

“I’m glad you’re having a good time.”

“Ok, Mom. Gotta go.” Male voices parried in the background. I understood the distraction.

“Ok…” Silence in the line told me he had hung up already.

For the first time in thirteen years Shane hung up without saying “I love you.”

But he does…

Driving Home

“Did you get it, yet? I checked, and it’s shipped. I really wanted you to have it by your birthday. I’m sorry it’s going to come after….”

The last word swung back and forth along the invisible line connecting their cell phones. She saw it getting larger, and then smaller, hurriedly rushing at her with the force of resignation, before dancing away in a pathetically hopeful soft-shoe. Her birthday was still three days away. “After” no longer meant just her birthday.

She smiled before she spoke, knowing it would sweeten her tone.

“Don’t worry about it.” She chuckled softly as much for her own encouragement as to ease his angst. “It will come, and I’ll love it. I know I will.” The blinders she’d donned earlier in the day, when he’d called to tell her the news, remained firmly in place as she trained her eyes on a colorless traffic light. Every word, every action, required a decision and focus. And though her car sat motionless for several minutes, she maintained a 10-and-2 death grip on the steering wheel. She only breathed when she had to.

Even before he spoke, she knew he was crying, again.

“I don’t know what’s gonna happen…”, he began.

She interrupted with resolution.

“Yes, you do. You know what’s going to happen, because it’s the only thing that can happen. We’ve talked about this.” She stopped to breathe and drew in the dust of her words. “From the very beginning we’ve talked about this. There’s nothing to think about.”

“Ok…” The second syllable rode the wave of a sob he couldn’t contain. Both were quiet while he tried harder. The cars around her began to move, and she moved with them.

“Ok..” This time he whispered the offending syllable and control powered the rest of his speech. “…but know this. I will never forget your birthday. Every year, on your birthday, you will hear from me.” The long “e” stretched longer on the end of a quiver. He cleared his throat, and she imagined him sitting taller in his leather office chair. The car in front of her slowed, forcing her to shift her feet.

“I promise.”

The words echoed between them, reminding her of all the promises he had to keep. He lived with a woman he’d promised to love and cherish until he died, and children, whose care was promised by their creation. She pictured him wearing a promise fashioned of cloth under one of his sensible suits as he offered an easy smile of welcome to those who would follow in his church-sanctioned footsteps.

Night had fallen while he spoke, and as she eased the car to a stop under another albino traffic light she tried to imagine him alone, unaccompanied by his promises. She thought she heard him sniff as he finally swam into view wearing a gaily colored madras shirt; the kind a family man wears on vacation…because that’s all he would ever be.

“Don’t do that.” Though spoken softly, her words rebuked argument. “Don’t make a promise you won’t keep…because you won’t…because you can’t…because promises mean everything to you.”

A whispered “I love you” caressed her ear as she made the final turn towards home.

“Promise.”

Jubilee

I dodge most of the puddles on the way to my car.

Most is the best I can do.

I love puddles.

Air that was cool for August is no less surprising, or unwelcome, on the first day of September.

I slide slacks over my sandals.

A fifty-year battle with procrastination dictates a stop for gas on my way to the office.

I’ll be late, and I don’t care.

It’s my birthday.

It is my birthday!

A smile of recognition and unexpected pride splits my face as I drive.

It’s my birthday!

The day has come, it’s finally here, and so am I.

I’m no worse for wear and remarkably better for meeting the milestone.

It’s done.

I didn’t expect the pride, the relief.

And, I revel in it.

Free, to be…

A Numbers Game

I spent the better part of my thirty-fourth year dreading my thirty-fifth. It wasn’t that I expected anything to change. I didn’t see thirty-five as some kind of horrific milestone, though now looking back on it, I think subconsciously I knew I’d reached a realistic half-way point.

What I couldn’t get past was the ugliness of the number itself, the overt roundness of it, the slovenly way it sits on its protuberant bellies as though fully sated and content in its rotundity. For twelve months I avoided, at every opportunity, speaking my age. The image invoked by the words disgusted me.

What makes this behavior remarkable is the fact that I assign no importance to age. I couldn’t tell you the age of my siblings, and it takes an appreciable amount of ciphering to determine my father’s. I know the age of my children, but only because I am expected to recite it with some frequency. If you admit to having children, you are expected to know when you had them. I suppose that’s fair…

For a full twelve months, while in my early forties, I aged myself by one year. As my birthday neared, a friend laughingly pointed this out to me, proving her point by counting backwards from my birth-date. She jokingly held forth my lapse as proof of some kind of mental instability, and her jeering bothered me at first, until I realized that my behavior only proved what I already knew; it really didn’t matter. For years, the question “How old are you?” forced me to think. It just wasn’t a number I carried around in my head.

Until now…

I still hesitate when asked my age, but not because I don’t know the answer. I hesitate because being forty-nine means I’ll soon be fifty, and I don’t want to be.

As my birthday nears, I find myself surrounded by two types of people; those who know, and those who don’t. And, it is those who know who have made it difficult to share with the others. For the first time in my life, people seem to feel it acceptable to pronounce me “old”. And, they do so, loudly, and often.

My father was the first to raise the baton. Months ago, as we chatted on the telephone, he mentioned my upcoming birthday, casually asking “How old will you be?”. He’s in his late seventies; the question didn’t surprise me. This was before I’d learned to hedge, and my answer came quickly.

“Fifty.”

“Fifty?” His voice was loud. “You’re going to be fifty?” This time his volume was accented by an accusatory tone. “Do you know how old that makes me feel…to have a daughter who’s going to be fifty?” He laughed as though he’d told a joke. I struggled to see the levity, while chuckling softly so as not to hurt his feelings.

Since that time, my birthday is never mentioned by anyone who doesn’t feel it perfectly appropriate to point out my longevity. Some appear awestruck; as though living fifty years is an accomplishment worth considerable thought and recognition. Some seem to feel as though my age poses a ticklish predicament. They giggle and point as though I’ve caught my heel in a sidewalk grate. And, of course, there are those whose faces fall in sympathy. I prefer not to know what they are thinking.

A dear friend mentioned my birthday the other day, and immediately asked how old I would be. As we’ve known each other only two years, he had no reason to know. Because he is a man, and younger, I really didn’t want him to.

I vacillated between simply ignoring the question and employing my finest southern accent, reminding him how improper it is to ask a lady her age, sure that in his usual manner he would soon turn the conversation in a different direction. While I hesitated he began to throw out numbers, “Fifty-five? Seventy-six? Fifty-two?”, until I could take no more.

“Fifty.” I said it, again.

“Well, why didn’t you just say so?” His response resounded with authenticity, imbuing me with the courage to explain. He listened quietly until I finished.

“I have to admit that while you were talking I imagined myself fifty…and my heart did a little flip.” That one didn’t even hurt.

Last Saturday, my children and several friends celebrated my birthday by coming to my house for a cook-out. My oldest son manned the grill, and everyone else brought plates and plates of my favorite foods. The broccoli casserole my daughter-in-law made was the best I’d ever tasted, and by the time I discovered the potato casserole my daughter had cooked, I had to scrape the sides of the dish just to get a taste. My delight in their cooking skills was enhanced by the feeling that they belonged to me. I hugged them both, telling them how much I appreciated them. They did me proud…

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Despite my warnings, my daughter insisted I have my favorite cake. The raspberry-filled, white-chocolate cake she produced was perfect. As we admired her creativity, in scattering wine-colored cherry blossoms around the perimeter of the plate, she produced the obligatory package of black and white candles; the kind that usually come with a set of gray, plastic headstones.

“Do you like the Emo candles?”, she asked demurely.

“Where are the matching headstones?”, I countered.

“I said they were Emo, Mama.”, she answered with quiet forcefulness. “I’m being sweet.”

I meant to mark this day. Had all gone according to plan, I’d be wearing a jacket against an early chill as I clicked down a neon-lit sidewalk in Times Square. We’d be on our way to dinner, fashionably late of course, in a restaurant requiring reservations be made months in advance. Tomorrow would have been our final day in New York City. Our visit to the fashion district would be a wonderful memory as I laced my sneakers for one last run through Central Park.

As it is, I accept the blessing of over-time with a company hedging its bets against a fragile economy. I’m schlepping my son to football practice, and I’m writing. My gift to myself is my writing. I will document my half-century in words, and feelings, and words, and epiphanies, and words.

Happy Birthday to me…