Iguanas, Ipods, and Birthdays

Today when I went running, my ipod was dead so I had to use my son’s. He’s nine. His ipod is newer than mine; it’s lime green and has slick graphics and better games. He also has a fairly eclectic range of music. I saw he had 16 playlists, which surprised me, including Carole King, White Christmas, and Graceland. But he had one playlist with 25 songs called “Party Mix,” so of course I chose that one. Party Mix?


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“Minnesota Polka” by Karl and the Country Dutchmen

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I headed out along the Erie canal path, determined to reach Sweden-Walker Road despite the heat. Yesterday I’d gone to Dick’s Sporting Goods and then Target to get myself some new running clothes. I love clothes, and have always been drawn to wintry fabrics like velvet, corduroy, and merino wool; athletic wear has always repelled me with its glossy sheen, meshy fabrics and jelly bean colors. But as I jogged along in my Blue Burst shorts and my Sun Flash top, I swore I ran better, faster, no side ache, no problem. It was the bright new clothes! And also, perhaps, my son’s music.

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“Fame” by Irene Cara

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I remember with both of my pregnancies, I’d swum laps at the college pool right up until the day of my deliveries. What I loved about swimming laps was not just that cool blue immersion but the meditative way I would mindlessly count each and every stroke. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6…and absolutely nothing else. I would not plan menus or classes. I would not worry and fret and make myself miserable. I would count and breathe and swim. When I run, I plan. My daughter’s sixth birthday party is on Saturday, and although we’re not “theme” kind of people, I run through a checklist in my head to see if all is in order: pink paper plates, purple plastic cutlery and purple napkins, a two-layer vanilla and chocolate cake, goody bags with the right balance of candy and toys (I’d spent probably half an hour in the birthday aisle at Target, debating: monster finger puppets or bundles of fake money? Nerds or Skittles? Glitter pens or hologram notebooks?). Because I want to give my children so many things that I never had, I sometimes find myself overdoing it.

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“Slash Dot Dash” by Fatboy Slim

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Lily actually turned six last week in Montserrat, a small island in the Caribbean just south of Antigua. We’d gone there because my husband, Mark, has been transfixed by volcanoes ever since the Mt. St. Helen’s eruption dropped ash on his hometown—miles away from the event. Every morning on Montserrat, roosters woke us up at our villa. Iguanas scootched around the yard, panting. We had packed brightly-wrapped gifts for Lily, but after she opened the pink Zhu Zhu pet named Jilly and its little pink bed, after she’d opened the rainbow sucker and pack of Orbit gum, I couldn’t shake the feeling that her birthday didn’t feel special enough. Sure, I’d stumbled around before I’d even had any coffee and whipped up some pancakes for her. I’d stuck a candle in the middle of the stack and we sang "Happy Birthdady" to her, but then—I don’t know. There we were in the middle of the tropics on a tiny nearly deserted island with a panoramic view of volcano, mountains and ocean, yet it felt “off” somehow for a six year old girl’s birthday. We so often dragged them around to places we thought would be “adventuresome” and they were. They certainly were.

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“Kids of the Future” by Jonas Brothers

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Hudson admitted to us after we got back from Montserrat that he wished he could have spent his latest birthday in a foreign country, as well. He’d turned six in Vietnam. We’d thrown a 3-day party for him there including a boat ride down the Mekong River and a stay at My Khanh Resort that offered straw huts right on top of the water. Lily had turned 3 in Taiwan; I’d wandered all around Taipei in the dark, searching for a fancy birthday cake and finally found one in the basement of a department store. It was a little chocolate mound with a flying elephant riding a wafer cookie on top. Once word got out about Lily’s birthday, the hotel also sent a cake up: white and elaborate like a wedding cake. We’d gone out to a smoky Japanese restaurant for dinner that night and what I remember most was looking out the smudged window as it rained and Lily sat, warm and snug, on my lap. That's what mattered.

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“Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen

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Listening to Hudson’s ipod makes me long for something I can’t name. It’s a mood perhaps, like nostalgia, or missing everything, then realizing it’s all right there in front of you.