The above words were part of a birthday message from Charlie, a beloved grandson. I have been doing a lot of reflecting on this stage of life and these words accurately summarize my thoughts. Jerry is ninety and I am eighty nine. We are fortunate to be blessed with reasonably good health. Some of our closest friends have not been so fortunate. Last weekend we attended the funeral of a dear friend of about fifty years. We feel her loss.

In an attempt to promote good health we are conscious of getting appropriate exercise. We golf – weather & bodies behaving – at least two times a week. It used to be eighteen holes but now it is just nine. The course we play at most often is a public course, Jefferson Park. It always amuses me when I reflect Jefferson Park was the original International Country Club – our golfing home of thirty-five years.

When we downsized this past year, we rented an apartment in Falls Church near our local families with the intent of buying a condo once our home was sold. When the house sold in three days it was just too soon to think of moving into a condo. In the past year we have come to really like living in our new apartment. There are about three hundred units which are occupied by folks with a diversity of age, ethnicity and background that makes this buildiing very special. In addition to the diversity aspect of our building there are some State Department employees who are residents on their home rotations. It is fun chatting with them about their various overseas assignments. Residents are very friendly. Sometimes I think it must be a little like living in a small town. Also the building management sponsors a community activity about once a week that helps to promote that small town feeling.

Growing up my brothers and I were blessed to have our parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins and great aunts and great uncles who to varing degrees were an important part of our lives. From our older relatives we got a personal introduction to the concept of aging. From my great Aunt Mary who lived into her late 90’s and who lived near Cornell University nursing school where I attended, I got a personal view of the development of nursing as a career. When Aunt Mary, who graduated from nursing school in 1892, would invite me for dinner and to spend the night, she would start off the evening by talking of her nursing days. Then she would abruptly stop and say ” I have talked enough. It is your turn. Tell me about nursing today. ” I loved those conversations as we covered about 60 years of changes.

My parents were very conscious of appropriately celebrating each of our birthdays. Bud’s birthday was October 24th and mine is April 26. I sometimes thought that my brother Pete with his January 10th birthday got cheated a little with birthday greetings and gifts from family and friends because his birthday was so close to Christmas. I remember a birthday in particular where the message that Pete found on opening several gifts was ” Merry Christmas and Happy Birthday”. I felt like he was being robbed of presents and promised myself that when I grew up and got married and had children, there would be no babies born in early January.

Eveybody deserves to have their birthdays adequately celebrated. When our firstborn arrived on January 8, 1962 Jerry and I were thrilled, but I still remembered my feelings about some of Pete’s celebrations. Jerry and I decided that it was important our children always feel the specialness of their own birthdays with each having a family birthday party, a friend party, and dinner out by themselves with Mom and Dad. We did that for many years. At the Mom and Dad celebration, we asked the birthday questions: ” What is the best thing that happened to you in this past year? ” and “What do you want to be when you grow up?” As the eighteen Grandchildren arrived on the scene, the celebration questions underwent some changes and a new birthday question was added: “What is your spirit animal?”

I felt particularly blessed by my this year’s birthday celebrations. including special cards and special calls from family and friends, dinner which Jerry and I shared with Pete and Lou and Nora and Art and another celebratory dinner with the Constances and the Jim Fergusons. We always used to also celebrate birthdays with the Eiseles, Donohues and Bartleys. Now these precious friends are no longer with us but the happy memories of those times are a treasure.

I agree with the words of Aretha Franklin ” Every birthday is a gift. Every day is a gift.”