Pop Rocks
By Tony Hicks
Unhappy Birthday to Me
A little party paranoia is a good thing, right?
My daughter is about to turn a year old.
Unlike the other birthday parties we throw for our kids – which are approached with slightly more preparation and glitz than the Academy Awards – this one was supposed to be low-key.
She’s only 1, we reasoned. She doesn’t really have any concept of what’s going on around her. She doesn’t get the age thing. To her, it’s just another house full of noisy people picking her up, invading her personal space, and shouting NUNUNUNUNUNU in her face.
We’d invite our families over, maybe barbecue and have a cake, keep things real simple. This is how we approach many events … initially. Then somehow this ripple starts picking up steam and, before you know it, we’re riding a party wave. And the closer we get to the appointed hour, the bigger and faster this wave becomes.
Not this time, I thought. It’s only a party for a 1-year-old. Which is why I was perfectly fine when my wife asked if she should send out an Evite. Great, I said, remembering that we vowed to keep things simple. A while later, I received my version of the Evite. Humming a happy tune, I scrolled down to look at the simple details we simply promised ourselves we’d invoke for this simple event. Simple, simple, simple.
There were 58 guests on the list.
I choked on my happy tune, blurting out something I can’t repeat in a family magazine. How does one have a simple celebration of the birth of this simple little girl – who doesn’t even speak real English yet and won’t remember any of this – by inviting more people to her birthday than Mommy and Daddy had at their wedding? And that’s not counting children, which would up the count to about 80.
I had visions of searchlights out front and valet parking. We’d be flying people in from all over the country. We’d have to rent ponies and a creepy balloon-twisting clown. And I hate creepy balloon-twisting clowns.
Now, of course, some of the emails were redundancies, sent to both parents in a family. Some were people who obviously can’t or won’t come because, as normal people, they don’t want to be anywhere near a house full of screaming children. I voluntarily made the decision to have children and even I don’t want to be anywhere near them much of the time.
I have to admit to being a bit panicked. As calmly as I could, I asked my wife what we had planned for all these people, who no doubt would be expecting, in exchange for taking a cherished day off to come to our daughter’s birthday party, heaps of food, drink and entertainment. How would we pay for this? The last time I checked, my credit cards were so full, one of them belched when I grabbed it. I have as much money in the bank as I did when I was 15 … and I didn’t even have a bank account until I was 18.
She sat me down, gave me my meds, had me breathe slowly into a paper bag for 10 minutes … then explained. We’d actually only have 20 to 30 people, most of them are family, and no one expects anything more than a sandwich and some cake. We don’t have to spend $200 on one of those giant blow-up things that will end up killing our lawn, and grandmas and aunts are supplying much of the food. And, best of all, we weren’t going anywhere near Chuck E. Cheese, to which I’ve developed a serious allergy the past couple years.
So I feel better. As modest, simple folk, we, of course, told guests gifts weren’t required – which means most people will bring shiny new toys and clothes for my daughter. Which will be nice. And, after all, it is an excuse to have a party. Best of all, my daughter hasn’t learned to make birthday demands yet. Now that I’ve settled down, I think I’m going to savor this day after all.
Tony Hicks is a columnist at the Contra Costa Times. |
