- December 20, 2024
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During dinner last weekend, just before the wine, my mom slipped in that — no big deal or anything — but we all kind of forgot to sing “Happy Birthday” to her last month. Me, my brother, my dad. All three of us.
And we didn’t get her a cake, either, she added, the way people do before you head out to the store and they remember they need eggs.
Poking the ice in our glasses, we all pretended not to hear this bit of had-to-be misinformation, figuring it probably made more sense to squeeze in one last compliment about this place’s ciabatta.
“And the olive oil,” Chris said, dunking then noshing on another piece. “So garlicky!”
With a little luck, the food would come in the next three seconds and the ceremonial “Oohs” and “Aahs” would start. That would divert attention from this shameless sneak attack my mother was staging. It would return things back to normal — where we all got to do whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted and she got to clean up after us.
That system hadn’t failed us for decades, and we could see in her eyes, even she was looking forward to letting this “forgetting my birthday” mumbo jumbo pass and getting back home to load all those empty coffee cups we left lying around before heading out into the dishwasher.
“And you can really taste the olives, too!” Chris’ girlfriend, Liz, threw in for good measure.
She’d chosen her side, and it was the right one. After all, Chris doesn’t come back into town all that often since he moved to Tampa, and we all know how much my mom enjoys her quality time. Who’d want to ruin that?
Finally — I decided after second five, when the food still hadn’t arrived, that the service at this place was obviously a train wreck and they peaked at the bread — I knew I had to tactfully get out in front of this thing with positive spin, add a bit of my signature charm to diffuse the situation.
So I said: “Stop whining. No cake? That can’t be right. You’re getting old and probably just don’t remember.”
Nailed it.
But Chris was still in hard-line ignore mode, which wasn’t surprising: He’d always been great at being terrible, the kind of kid who’d conveniently take a four-hour bathroom sabbatical every time my parents got back from the store and needed help unloading.
“Yep,” my mom said. “No cake. Very nice.”
“Jeez, sorry, ma,” I said.
“I’m hungry,” pops interjected.
And Chris said, “This ciabatta!”
But really, it’s not like we completely forgot her birthday. We still did gifts and dinner. Chris came into town. We just didn’t suffer through that horrific song — empirically the most depressing of all celebration anthems. That was a favor. No “thank yous” necessary.
And yes, we didn’t eat ice cream cake. But isn’t it enough already with the ice cream cake?
An extraordinarily astute child, I noted from an early age that most ice cream cakes were really just cake-shaped ice cream and, thus, a total sham. Cue boycott. I know: Carvel throws some brownie bits in there to maintain the illusion but, really, who are they fooling?
If I want ice cream, I’ll have ice cream, thank you very much. And If I want cake, I’ll have cake.
But to call my brother, my father and my social commentary simple “forgetting” is a low blow. The best gift you can give someone is not forcing them to plaster on a fake grin while people chant at them and call it singing.
Happy Birthday? Yeah, good one. At least it used to be.
BY MIKE CAVALIERE | ASSOCIATE EDITOR
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