Day 35 - Birthdays: Worst and Best!

We recently hosted a surprise 75th birthday party for my father-in-law.

The entire family was around him and more importantly his close friends had been invited as well. I refered to that in my blog post of Day 27 (Family but not Family) .

While my FIL is not given to emotions, I think from his surprised look we were fairly confident that he had a good time and liked what we did.


But this got me thinking about birthdays. Birthdays are important days for us, aren't they? Irrespective of what age we reach. Its always fun to get wishes from everyone and in today's world with Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites, birthdays becomes days when you feel loved and wanted. You get to see so many wishes from everyone that its absolute fun. But of course the best wishes come from your family and closest friends. Across many years now, I have always received a hard copy card in the post from my parents for my birthday and I look forward to it. But once in a while comes across a birthday which turns out to be not so good.

Here are my two WORST and two BEST birthdays.

WORST
1994: I was in Mumbai staying with my cousin and between jobs. On my birthday I was all alone. My cousin brother and his family didn't remember my birthday and probably didn't care. Remember these were days with no cell phones and so I didn't get a call from my parents either. I actually searched the telephone directory and found the number of a long lost friend who I called, spoke to and just happened to mention that it was my birthday just so someone could wish me on that day. That was probably the worst birthday that I had as I left quite lonely.

2006: It was like any other birthday. I got wishes from my family, a cute card from my daughter, parents and sister called and wishes me and so did some friends. So why do I call this as one of my worst? Because the one close friend who I thought very highly of forgot my birthday and did not call me at all. I waited and waited for her call but nothing. The fact that she did not call me cast a shadow on all the beautiful things that others had done and that's the reason I categorise this as one of my worst birthdays. In my view, good friends are supposed to remember friends birthdays. Of course, its a different perspective that a few months later and even bigger storm was to hit our friendship, but that's a different blog.

BEST
1980 or around that time: I must have been 8 or 10 years old and I wanted a cycle very badly. So as my birthday approached I started asking my parents for a cycle for myself. I promised I would take care of it and ride it everyday. I was almost convinced that I would get the cycle on my birthday and waited eagerly for the day to come. Come the day and there was no cycle. I waited, went to school, came back, cut the cake and still no cycle. I asked my parents and they said that they are not getting a cycle for me as it is too expensive. That's when I could not take it and started crying and bawling. My Dad decided to take me out (it was almost night and quite dark) to calm me down and explain things to me. I went along quite depressed. We reached the main road and my Dad kept looking up and down the road. Suddenly (like in the movies) I see a red cycle being ridden and coming close to my Dad. He thanks the person and says here's your surprise. It was all a drama to surprise me and that was the best birthday of my short life till then. I thanked my parents profusely, hugged them, kissed them and loved my cycle. I still remember that day.

2009: Yes...this year's birthday was one of the best birthdays of my life. I was in Singapore and returned a day before to a party at my house with family friends. But that was the expected one. As the clock turned midnight they all wished me, had dinner and started to leave. We decided to meet later in the evening for the actual birthday party. That evening my wife prepared some good food, got dressed and sat with me. I was wondering why she was dressed so well for our regular family friends coming home but then thought that maybe coz it was my birthday. I was relatively sloppily dressed. The bell rang and I opened the door to the biggest surprise of the day. There standing at the door were my two closest friends with their family and the third one was on her way. This was the group of three that I love very much. These are my closest friends and not necessarily my wife's. She had taken the effort to call them, invite them, ensure that it was a surprise, told our family friends to go along when I said that we'll see them that evening and set this whole birthday party for me. WOW.....that was something and I loved her even more!

So these are my two worst and best birthdays till date.

What are yours?