Birthday Season
Big birthday lists these days. The weekend kicked off with El Oso hitting up a party at Whacky Warriors Paintball for a good friend turning 33. Sometimes I think about my ancestors living to the ripe old average age of 33 in their damp castles in Scotland, patting themselves on the back for living a good long life saying in that thick brogue, “Eh, I’ve lived a fine life. Guess I ought to be callin’ it a day now.” Or Alexander the Great, one of my other infamous grandpas. Didn’t he kick the bucket at 33? And here we are paintballing. Funny stuff.
Anyway, while El Oso enjoyed getting shot with heavy artillery, Puck and I lounged around the Silverspoon casa with plates of roast chicken, rosemary bread, and episodes of “Wildest Islands” on Netflix, while Theodore continued to mud the basement.
Celebrations continued at the Big House by 5:30, for Joe and Jaya. Piles of gifts, plates stuffed with pork chops (a Snicketts-boy staple) and other goodies. Picnic tables in the cool September evening. Carrie and I discussed how neither of us liked it. Not warm enough, the angle of the sun was all wrong. Autumn had arrived too quickly.
During the grand opening of all gifts in the backyard, the neighbor next door decided it was an opportune moment to start using his chain saw on a pile of brush for his bonfire.
“THANK YOU FOR THE PRESENTS EVERYONE!” Joe yelled over the cacophony.
The chainsaw lulled for awhile, just long enough for Francis to bring a Tupperware of fireworks from his room. This is usually a bad idea. The boys thought they’d light the bonfire with a few sparklers or whatever else Francis had saved from July.
It didn’t work, of course. So while a road flare roasted in the twigs to no avail, we sang “Happy Birthday” around a chocolate bundt caked … right as the chain saw powered up again. The final notes were screeched out in competition – I think the chainsaw won. And the boys finally got that bonfire crackling, with methods I never learned. Probably something dangerous though, because I heard Carrie scolding the boys to look out for Grandma and the little kids. Which led to conversations about Grandma’s epithet on her tombstone, which is a topic Grandma could always find amusing.