1. What are your feelings about celebrating birthdays, especially your own?
I enjoy celebrating other people's birthdays far more than I do my own -- not just because I'm getting older, but because my family just didn't "do" birthdays well. Which brings us to...
2. Do you have any family traditions about birthdays?
Birthdays in my family tended to be more like the Costanza family's Festivus day -- Airing of Grievances and other assorted drama. I escaped this kind of thing on my birthday only because my birthday is the day after Christmas, and as such it was usually subsumed into that celebration; I mean, when your competition is Baby Jesus, you can't win when it comes to birthdays. When I was small my aunt M would take pity on me and throw a birthday party for me in June; but it just wasn't the same.
3. Is it easy to remember friends' and family members' birthdays? If so, how do you do it?
It's extremely difficult for me to remember people's birthdays, I think because I've never made a big deal about my own. I find Facebook to be very helpful in reminding me about birthdays; also those online card companies that, if you're a member, send you reminders about loved ones' birthdays several days ahead of time. This question, by the way, is inspiring me to add a "birthdays" sheet to our household Three-Ring Binder of Useful Facts, especially since Fellow Traveler also has trouble remembering birthdays.
4. What was one of your favorite birthdays? (or your unhappiest?)
My unhappiest birthday was when I was about five, sick in bed with pneumonia; definitely not fun. One of my favorite birthdays was a few years ago when Fellow Traveler treated me to a romantic bed-and-breakfast getaway up north on the Leelanau Peninsula. As luck would have it, an unseasonable warm snap hit the area when we arrived; imagine green grass, rain and peasoup fog in northern Michigan in late December. Then, just as suddenly, the temperature plunged again, bringing with it a combination ice storm and blizzard; this made for a rather cozy evening trapped at our B&B, drinking wine and playing Scrabble as the wind howled and ice pellets slammed into the windows outside...driving home the next morning, not so much. But in retrospect it was a pretty swell time overall.
5. Post anything else you want to share about birthdays, including favorite foods, songs, and/or pictures.
During the aforementioned birthday trip to the Leelanau, we visited a lovely rustic Italian restaurant called Trattoria Funistrada. Finding it involved navigating up and down curving, hilly back roads at night in fog thick enough to cut with scissors. By the time we crept into Burdickville, the little Glen Lake neighborhood where the restaurant is located, FT and I were both literally aching from the angst of stressed driving; so how wonderful to walk in and find a warm, friendly place that seemed to have been dropped into this unlikely landscape directly from rural Italy. We had a great meal there; conversed with the people sitting all around us because it's that kind of restaurant; had a lovely time. For some reason Funistrada's website seems to be down, but you can read some reviews (including mine) here.
1 comment:
ah, yes, what would a holiday be without some family drama? Thanks for telling the truth about that.
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