Ann's Column: I love birthdays!

I love birthdays! Ask any of my friends from any of my past lives, and they will confirm that Ann definitely loves birthdays. Birthdays are a time to celebrate, and I love to celebrate. I celebrate when my baby pink iris emerges each Spring or the pineapple lily that surprises me every year; I celebrate when the Red Sox win or any ACC team.   There are so many things to celebrate that I get tipsy just thinking of all.  However, the number one thing for me has always been birthdays! Perhaps my Mother instigated my love of birthdays. My Dad, older brother, and I had December birthdays.  She didn’t want us to get lost in the hustle of ribbon and paper, and chaos of the Holidays.  She made sure that we each had a special day devoted to us alone.  As I got older, I soon discovered that my college friends, then my work friends, then all my friends liked to celebrate my birthday too. In the middle of December, the hype was escalating and people felt they were going to pop, pop, pop. So, it was fun to have an excuse to celebrate early.  Now, in these older years, my friends  and I may want to celebrate but definitely in much quieter, more peaceful ways.

I remember others’ birthdays too, and celebrate with special cards, texts, or maybe a toast---CHEERS!   Years ago, I bought a SHAKESPEARE BIRTHDAY BOOK because it had a quote for every day of the year. When I first saw the book, I turned the page for my day, and there was one of my favorite quotes, “If all the year were playing holidays, to sport would be as tedious as to work.” That is a good reminder for us all, especially for a Sagittarius.  I just opened the book and it fell open to July 1, and this is the quote which certainly fits a friend who has that birthday, “Here we will sit, and let the sounds of music Creep into our ears….” Randomly, I turn to another page and see July 25; I have a friend with that birthday, and I believe she would be one of the first to understand this quote from King Lear, “when we are born, we cry that we come to this great stage of fools.” This little birthday book is fun and often right on target with apt Shakespearean quotes. It’s one of my favorite treasures.

May 22 is my Mother’s birthday; she is the one  who made birthdays so much fun, and I have been thinking of her a lot.  Sometime, during her last years, she told me why she made birthdays special for each family member.  She grew up in a large family, and she had an older sister whose birthday was two days before hers.  She always had to share a birthday, and she came second; she always wanted one of her own.

 So, I know that my Mother would like to have a day of her own, a cake of her own, but I also know that she would give it all up for one big wish: for a birthday of no political bickering, one day of world peace, one day of no hatred or mass murders.