BIRTHDAY CELEBRATIONS

BIRTHDAY CELEBRATIONS

I am not a very social person when it comes to the question of celebrating birthdays. I find the celebration a sheer waste of time, money and efforts. On the contrary I would prefer to sit in a secluded place with a close friends or family who are intimate and very dear to me. May be we will indulge in a sumptuous lunch, warm and cozy gossip! But strange are the ways of the world, many proclaim their birthdays even using posters and call all & sundry to have a big bash! Someone recently told me that every birthday reminds us that we are moving closer the end of our time on earth, so why to celebrate that reminder!

We are four brothers and when we were small and going to school everyone’s birthday was important as the same would fetch each one of us same color and pattern dress! Apart from that a heavy lunch with plenty of Payasam ( Kheer) used to be the specialty of that day !Thus we used to get four sets of clothes only for birthdays followed by one for Diwali and one for Pongal. As we started growing my parents found it difficult to maintain the same system. Therefore only the birthday boy got a set of new dress. After sometime when we left for college etc. the same stopped altogether.

When we started having family and kids of our own we got a bit more extravagant and a cake was always on order for birthday! But I still do not remember such a lavish extravagance in my household as I was against that any way. Children these days carry goodies to school and distribute. There are return gifts, theme parties what not to make the event all the more glaring and baring!

Recently my neighbor had an issue in his home. He had moved to stay here from India recently. His seven year old boy had his birthday a week back. The boy stays alone in the campus and he had dreams of making the function big and memorable by inviting all Indians in the campus and having a party. The father had other ideas and mother had something altogether different. In the end, nothing was lined up for the birthday. My wife told me that the boy was going to get disappointed and we must do something. As she is a universal counselor she could not wait to see the boy getting disappointed and dejected. I was told to do something by lunch time. I had a bunch of greetings card for birthday with me. Promptly one was written in the name of the boy. Some colorful drawings were made on the envelope. A few currency notes were inserted.

My wife in the meanwhile had drawn a big Rangoli in front of their court yard. Special Pooja was performed by my wife and the child’s mother. The boy was seated in an elevated chair and Tilak was applied on the boy’s forehead and after Pooja he was given sweets etc. By lunch time I had paid a visit to their home and handed over the greetings card along with some chocolates carefully wrapped by my wife.

I was thinking that all was well and the day for the boy was made. I too took some sweets home and got going with work. By evening there was some faint sound of whining and crying. Our domestic in house counselor, that is my beloved wife, urged me to join her to find out what was wrong. I politely declined and refused to accompany her. Who am I to stop her freedom of counseling? She paid a visit to them and came back proclaiming that my neighbor was insensitive and totally lacked interpersonal skills. I asked her the reason for such a conclusion. She politely told me that he could not arrange for a cake for the small boy and she had to salvage the situation by placing a candle and the chocolate slab we had given. She had requested the boy to cut the cake and sang happy birth day song so loudly so that the mother could take a video and post it in her face book! She also told me that the neighbor’s wife is so smart and reason for conclusion was that the post was done so nicely the chocolate pieces were giving an impression of big chocolate cake!!  She also told that the morning Rangoli and Pooja had elicited by then 108 Likes and 63 comments !!!