Mom's 90th Birthday...

If Mom were still alive, today would have been her 90^th birthday.  Celebrating Mom’s birthday was always a huge priority for our family, so the date of June 6^th is really emblazoned in my memory.  I remember once telling Mom that she was born on D-Day, and she quickly corrected me by saying, “No Ralphie, they launched D-Day on my birthday!”  And she was quite right—she was here long before D-Day.

Besides being D-Day, the 6^th of June seemed to be a magnet for special events in our family.  Mom and Dad were married on June 6^th.  My brother and I graduated on June 6^th.  It has always been a very special date on the calendar for our family.

It is hard to believe but it has already been ten years since we had the last really big birthday party for Mom.  We had surprise parties for her 70^th and her 75^th, and both of those experiences convinced us that, what with her weakening physical condition, it would definitely NOT be a good idea to have a surprise party for her on her 80^th birthday.  (At least not if we wanted her to be around for her 81^st birthday!)  And so the task became one of convincing her that we should have a party for her 80^th.  She was absolutely against it.  She did not like it at all when we made a big deal about her birthday.  All she ever really wanted was to be together with me, my brother and his wife.  On the other hand, it began to become clear that part of her really wanted to get together with a larger group of her family and her friends.  And so the negotiating began.  It wouldn’t be a party, it would be a Mass of Thanksgiving followed by a reception.  No one should be allowed to bring gifts, because the way she saw it everyone had been a gift to her throughout her life and she wanted this gathering to be a way of saying “thank you” to everyone who had filled her life with so much love and joy over the years.  And so the decision was made to go ahead with the celebration and the invitations went out—which is when the fun really started.

I still have the recordings of Mom calling me and leaving me a message every time someone called to tell her that they were going to be coming to her party.  It brought her such great joy to call me and let me know that this special cousin or that special friend was going to be coming.  She got more and more excited with each passing day.  (By the way, the reason that I still have all of those recordings is really a fluke of my geekiness.  At that time in my life my Mac was also my answering system.  Little did I realize that there was a folder filling up with archival copies of all of my phone messages.  After Mom passed away and before I began a dubious and short lived flirtation with PCs, I did some file cleaning on the Mac and found over one hundred phone messages that Mom had left me during that time, all of which I still have and treasure to this day.)

When the big day finally arrived, it was more than any of us could ever have hoped for.  Mom had such a delightful time and she really had the chance to visit with so many of the people who she loved so very much.  And something pretty special happened:  everyone knew that they were not supposed to bring presents, but a lot of people really felt like they should bring Mom at least some kind of small gift.  Knowing Mom’s great love for angels, she received about two dozen statues and figurines of angels for her birthday.  She was so happy and couldn’t wait to get home to find a special place in the house for each and every one of them.  Needless to say, we still have each and every one of those special angels as a wonderful memory of that great celebration.

After a few days had passed and I had a chance to show Mom the rather informal video that we had taken of the party, she said something pretty incredible:  “Thank God I had the chance to celebrate with all of my family and my friends while I still have my health and could still really enjoy myself.  I have a funny feeling that the next time everyone gets together it won’t be for my 85^th.”  As it turned out, our last family birthday celebration with Mom was just us for her 83^rd birthday in 2001.  Mom passed away in January of 2002, just a little over four months shy of her 84^th birthday.  And her family and friends did get together again that cold and snowy day, so far from the beauty of June 6^th.  Another kind of Mass to celebrate and give thanks for her life, and another kind of reception to thank everyone for the gift of their love and support for her and for all of us.

So now Mom is celebrating her 90^th birthday with all of her family and friends who are with her in heaven.  And now the angels are the real thing, not just statues and figurines.  One day I’ll be there at that party too.  But until then, I’m watching the video again, playing back some of those awesome phone messages, and looking at her precious angels all around her house.  Happy birthday, Mommy!  We love you, we miss you, and we will always celebrate June 6^th as a special day, a day filled with love and many, many happy memories!