Photo courtesy George Hodan, PublicDomainPictures.net.
When I was born they had to use forceps, which screwed up my face. Family lore has it that dad’s first words upon seeing his firstborn were (to my mom): “It’s okay honey, we’ll buy her pretty clothes and develop her personality.”
My husband gets a big kick out of that one. Until I remind him that now it’s his turn to buy me pretty clothes, and maybe a diamond trinket or two.
Like that’s ever going to happen.
He has lowered the bar on my expectations down so low that I’m thrilled if he remembers to make dinner reservations, and positively orgasmic if he deigns to call a babysitter. So maybe he learned something at Harvard.
The one thing he doesn’t have to be subtly reminded about is the all-important cake. The chocolate cake. We settled that issue early on in our relationship.
I was young and naïve and googly-eyed in love at the time, and tickled to death when my future husband took me out for a lovely birthday dinner. My favorite friends were all there, the food was great, the drinks were plentiful, and he had even bought me the perfect pair of earrings I had slyly hinted might flatter my lobes.
After a rough, first year start—“not every girl dreams of a boyfriend who will give her a $3.99 birthday gift from K-Bee Toys,” I explained, gently—it seemed like Zak was finally starting to “get” me.
It was that night that I started to think our relationship might not just be a phase (which my sister still thinks), that he might actually be “the one.”
Then he took me home, and the trouble began. There was no cake. No cake! Not just no chocolate cake, which would have been a near-fatal error in itself, not an ill-advised angel food concoction or an unfortunate cheesecake. Not even a pineapple upside down cake!
I was about ready to turn Zak upside down when he offered the pitiful excuse, “But we just had crème brulee at the restaurant. With a candle.” And what on earth did that have to do with my missing birthday cake?
He truly didn’t get it.
In my family, birthdays are a big deal. They last at least a month, with both family and friend versions of the celebration. In recent years we’ve widened the spectrum a bit to include the family with and without kids celebrations, and the friends with and without kids celebrations, which should pretty much fill my calendar until Thanksgiving.
Cake is mandatory, but candles are optional. However, as my husband learned the hard way (“it’s just a flesh wound, darling”), the proper way to count out birthday candles is your age plus “one to grow on.” This is science, and his family is clearly medieval.
And by the way, I saw a really cute purse on sale downtown. I think it would look great with my personality.
Leslie will be accepting birthday wishes—and cake—for the next several months at Leslie@LeslieDinaberg.com.
Originally appeared in the Santa Barbara Daily Sound on September 8, 2006.