"My 70s Show"

By Jerry Zezima

On Jan. 11, 1954, a date which will live in infancy, I made my grand entrance into the world. I arrived more than three weeks past my due date and have seldom been on time for anything since.

On Jan. 11, 2024, the date on which I turned 70, my mother, Rosina, who will turn 100 on Nov. 10, called to wish me a happy birthday and said, “I’d buy you a watch, but it wouldn’t do any good.”

Now that I have hit the big 7-Oh, I am planning a yearlong celebration. And I haven’t been late for any of the four parties — including one at my mother’s house — I have had so far.

The first occurred when my wife, Sue, and I visited the home of our older daughter and her family a couple of weeks before my birthday.

The highlight was when our grandchildren — a boy, 6, and his twin siblings, a girl and a boy, 4 — presented me with a coloring book. Then we had cookies.

“Happy birthday, Poppie!” they sang.

I felt years younger. In fact, if you transpose the numbers 7 and 0, that would be my intellectual age.

Later, my daughter and her husband took me (and Sue) out to dinner.

“Cheers!” they said as we clinked glasses.

It was a nice, low-key way to mark the momentous occasion. Afterward, I fell fast asleep.

The second celebration was with my mother, who reminded me — because I am getting forgetful in my old age — that I set the record for being the most overdue baby in the history of Stamford Hospital in our hometown of Stamford, Connecticut.

“You were due on Dec. 20,” she said. “You didn’t want to come out.” She smiled and added, “But you were worth the wait.”

My mom, a retired nurse who used to work at the hospital, said that since pregnancies aren’t allowed to go so long anymore, my record will never be broken.

“You were also born during a blizzard,” she noted.

“And I have been perpetrating snow jobs ever since,” I said.

Mom didn’t disagree.

“I never thought I would live to see a child of mine turn 70,” she said.

“I’m shockingly immature,” I told her. “It makes me seem younger.”

She didn’t disagree with that statement, either.

The party — which included Sue, our younger daughter, her husband and their two daughters, ages 10 and 7, as well as my two sisters, my niece and my two nephews — culminated with a birthday apple pie with, of course, the numbers 7 and 0 on top.

My granddaughters helped me blow out the five candles.

“If you had 70 candles,” my mother said, “we would have had to call the fire department to put them out.”

“Just wait until you hit the century mark,” I said. “It’ll be a hot time.”

On my actual birthday, I made myself an Egg McJerry for breakfast because, I told Sue, “I’m worth it.”

“You sure are,” she said before making an appointment for an arbor care specialist to come over in the afternoon to give us an estimate for taking down a couple of sick oaks and carting away a huge branch that had fallen in a recent storm.

“Some people celebrate milestone birthdays by going on a cruise,” I said. “I’m celebrating mine with a tree guy.”

That evening, Sue bought me a special dinner — spaghetti with red clam sauce — from an Italian supermarket. For dessert, I had a cannoli with a candle on either end.

“What an exciting birthday!” I gushed appreciatively. “I may have to go to bed early.”

A couple of days later, our younger daughter and her family — including our two oldest granddaughters — came over for yet another celebration.

Sue baked a Funfetti cake for the occasion. The girls again helped me blow out the candles.

“Being 70 is a lot of fun!” I said. “And it helps if you’re not late to the party.”

Copyright 2024 by Jerry Zezima