The strange coincidence of birthdays

There are some dates that become unexpectedly important to you in your life.
November 14th is one of those dates for me.
To begin with, it's the birthday of my husband, Ninesh- a-goes-without-saying-important date.

Happy Birthday Ninesh

But that's just the beginning.
Because co-incidentally it's the birthday of two other people who have become very special to us.
It' s the birthday of the eldest daughter of one of my best friends. 
But what makes her " not just a daughter," is the fact that she's adopted.
She and her younger sister, not born on November arrived in the arms of my friend and her husband more than 10 years ago 
The wait had been a long, hard and frustrating one.
Sometimes my friend  would come round and talk about it: the raised hopes, the shattered dreams, the heartache, the constant expectation, the impersonal  beaurocratic, box-ticking nightmare of the adoption service.
There would be days when she would float through the door, hopeful, smiling
" They think they've found a match," she would say, " nothing's certain yet but...." and her eyes would stare dreamily into the rose-tinted, child-filled future.
But there were other days, days when she would sit on our sofa, huddled over a cup of tea, trying to be brave, trying not to show that her heart had been broken again,.. the match hadn't worked out or the birth parents were being given another chance or the children were being offered to someone else first...
" It's alright," she'd say, trying to smile, " I guess.. they weren't the ones.

And then there was the day the wait was over.
There was a ring on the bell
" I've got something I want to show you,"  she said, sitting down at the table while I put the kettle on.
I watched as she pulled two photos out of her bag.
" Holiday shots?" I asked.
" No," she said, shaking her head and handing me the photos.
I took them and stared at the two girls smiling out at me.
"I wanted to show you my...our....," I watched her hesitate, like she wasn't sure if she had the right to say the words, " I wanted you to see our... daughters." 
There she sat, my friend who was already a mother long before she had children, my friend whose aching emptiness had at last been filled, my friend showing me photos of two of the luckiest girls in the world.
It's always easy to try and read too much into things, to try and put a positive spin on what is essentially bad, to explain away every cloud by finding its silver lining.
And of course I would never wish upon anyone the agony, emotional anguish and sadness of not being able to give birth to your own children. 
But when I see my friend and her husband with their two girls now, it's impossible not to think that it was meant to be.
Not to think that somehow in this crazy, unpredictable universe of ours, they were meant to find each other and be a family. 
And somehow, sitting there in our kitchen, photos in hand, that day, I wasn't surprised when I found out her eldest daughter and Ninesh shared a birthday.
It seemed right somehow, like an invisible thread bonding her new family with ours. 
And in the end, it's the thousands of invisible threads  connecting us all that make us who we are and catch us when we fall.
A shared birthday is just the start and it's hard to explain why it's special.
Because birthdays are strange, they are like coloured bookmarks in the pages of our lives, a subconscious marking of the beginning and ending  of chapters, a chance to celebrate what we have achieved and how far we have come or an opportunity to make a promise  that next year will be better. 
Or, of course, they are simply an excuse for a party.
But the best thing about birthdays ( and the older you get, the fewer good things there are ) is the people who remember.  There are people you only speak on your or their birthdays, people who are part of your past, from a different page of your life but whose warmly, familiar voices immediately make you smile and float you back into the kind of friendships that can only be created by time.
But time is something one of our friends never had.
In another one of those quirky birthday co-incidences, it turned out that one of the friends we met in Chichester was also born on the same day as Ninesh, just a few years later...
I met her at the Children's Centre where I worked and very quickly, unusually quickly for us, our families became friends.  Although their children were younger than ours, we spent a lot of time together, walking, talking, chatting, laughing.
It was while we were camping together for the weekend that we discovered that she, Ceylan, and Ninesh shared a birthday. But as soon as I found out, just like with my friend's adopted daughter, I wasn't surprised. It just seemed like another thing that connected us, another coincidence that added to the sense of "meant-to-be-ness," of our friendship.
Laughing, Ninesh and she, both of them quietly passionate, thoughtful, caring and kind people, planned the shared birthday parties of their future.
And under that starry sky, it wasn't the flames of the barbecue we were huddled around that kept us warm, but the certainty that our friendship was a lasting one.
I'm glad I didn't know then that Ceylan only had two more birthdays left to share with Ninesh.
Glad that, for at least one of those birthdays, she and Ninesh did celebrate together.
Glad that, because the 14th of November is Ninesh's birthday too, we will never forget to remember.

Ceylan, trying ( unsuccessfully ) to unicycle through the campsite on our son's unicycle

In a room of 23 people, there is a 50/50 chance that 2 people will share the same birthday. 
In a life full of twists and turns and crossing paths, I'm not sure what the odds are.
But it doesn't really matter.
All I know is that the 14th of November has become a very special day for me because it is the birthday of so many people I care about. 

So here's to love and laughter and silver linings, to star-filled memories and smiling photos and most of all, here's to very, very happy birthdays.

50 years of happiness and soup bowl mortality

We have just come back from an amazing holiday to celebrate my parents' 50th wedding anniversary.
What made it so incredible, apart from the constant sunshine and unendingly delicious food, was the fact that all their grandchildren- aged from 11 to 17 -said it was the best week of their lives.
And I'm wondering how my parents have done it.
Not only how they've managed to survive 50 years of togetherness, but also how they've  managed to inspire such love and devotion from their ( mostly ) teenage grandchildren. 

Lisa and Vic 1964

Lisa and Vic 2011

" How have you and Lisa done it?"  Matty and Mia, the two eldest granddaughters asked their granddad while we were there." How have you two stayed together for 50 years?"
My dad, Vic, looked thoughtful.
" I don't know the answer to that," he said, " I suppose it's like Lisa explained on the phone the other day...." and he began to tell the story.
Mum and dad had been sitting down, having a quiet bowl of soup with crusty bread for lunch, when the phone rang.
Like most people their age, my parents have a long list of ailments.  Most recently it is my mum, who suffered a stroke about 5 months ago.
So when it was their GP on the phone it wasn't particularly surprising.
" So Mrs Gersten, How are you?" she asked.
" Not too bad," said my mum cheerfully.
" Good, good," said the GP "I just have a quick question,"
" OK," said my mum.
" If you were to have another stroke, would like us to put -do not resuscitate - on your file?" 
My mum who is rarely ruffled by anything, was completely thrown by the question
" Well, I um... I," she stuttered, " well, the  thing is... " her eyes rested on my dad, " the thing is, I think we still need each other. So I don't think I do."
Being faced with your own mortality over a bowl of soup can really spoil the flavour.
For days afterwards my mum was shaken by the call.
" It's just not the thing you expect someone to phone and ask you at lunchtime," she said.
"Or anytime," I want to add.
" But what she said was true," explained my dad looking affectionately at my mum and addressing his young, fashionably bikinied granddaughters, " After 50 years we still need each other."

And perhaps that's it, the thing that keeps people together for 50 years is mutual need.
But I can't help feeling there's something more to it than that..
For the last 50 years my parents have been each other's constant companions. 
Through good times and bad they have never stopped being there for each other, never stopped caring, never stopped trying to make the best of things and somehow, they have never stopped finding things to laugh about.

When one of my friend's was getting divorced, she had to tell her daughter's teacher.
" Why are you doing that," the teacher asked
" Well, we just don't get on anymore," mumbled my friend.
" That's ridiculous," said the teacher, " my parents have hated each other for years and they're still together!"
So perhaps the extraordinary thing about my parents: after 50 years they don't hate each other.
Most of the time, they're even quite fond of each other! 
Like everyone, they have had their share of disappointments, missed opportunities and unfulfilled dreams.
" When I think of all the mistakes I have made ...." sighs my dad.
" How about all the successes?" I say.
He just shrugs,
But even he must admit that their marriage counts as a big success.
I watch him and my mum surrounded by their children, their children-in-law, and all their grandchildren.
Everyone is laughing and chatting, enjoying being there with them.
And perhaps I see what they don't see: that they have created something special, something that many people aspire to and few actually achieve.
They have created a family who love each other and who love them. 
And perhaps that won't make any of us rich or famous but it does make us happy.

And if 50 years of marriage does nothing more than create happiness, it has been a race worth running - even if it is with a zimmer- frame these days.