The actual day.
Friday, June 12th, 2020
My family had what was an unannounced but seemingly cast-into-stone tradition that when you had a party or any commemoration of a person’s birthday, it had to happen on the actual day, or it was somehow diminished or of less repute. You could blow out the candle and eat that cake on the next day, or the day after, but it wouldn’t have the magic.
I think that now my father, the chief enforcer (?) of those traditions is no longer around to make arbitrary pronouncements like that, we’ve come to be a bit more flexible, realistic. The next generation, advanced on matters of birthdays!
That said, given the stresses of the past few months, I’m glad that my brother had a celebration of his birthday on the actual day, with his nuclear family, and I’m glad that we’ll have a safe, socially distant but in person commemoration with him and them on the next day, and no magic cake (as far as I know) will be involved.
Because, you know, the magic. Happy birthday, JPB.
