Birthday Bonanza

This Sunday, three family birthdays will be celebrated. I will be 26, my brother will be 29, and my nephew will be 2.

Growing up, my brother and I had the same birthday routine: a half white cake (usually with GI Joes or something violent), the other half was chocolate cake (consisting of Care Bears, Strawberry Shortcake or Barbie, depending on the year), with vanilla and chocolate ice cream. We’ve partied at Mickey D’s, skating rinks, and a variety of other places. However, most people don’t know the significance of our shared birthdays. Let me enlighten you. But first, we have to travel back in time. (Get in the Delorian!)

Before I was born, my parents had 2 boys. They loved them dearly, but thought, “We can do better than this! We need a little girl.” For years they looked into local adoption. Because they already had two kids, they were told to go home and be happy. Luckily, my parents are relentless, I mean, persistent. So they began looking into foreign adoption.

One day my mom received a call from the adoption agency. There was a beautiful baby that had recently been born in Seoul, South Korea. Oddly enough, my mom’s first question was, “When was she born?” The lady on the phone replied January 11. Mom was speechless for a moment. That was the date of her second son’s birthday too. “We’ll take her,” she stated. The lady was stunned and asked if she wanted any other information before officially adopting this child she knew nothing else about. My mom said she knew all she needed to know to make the decision. Four months later they received a healthy, gorgeous baby girl to add to their family…And I’ve been here ever since. Thank God I wasn’t born on the 12th! Whew!

Two years ago, my sister-in-law was preggers. She decided to be induced on January 11. For 24 years, I had accepted only getting ½ of a birthday. But 1/3?? That’s 33.33%! The selfish, frugal, crap-I-gotta-buy-more-cards-and-gifts-on-my-own-birthday, monster inside me began to rear its ugly head. However, once I saw that precious baby boy, I got over it. Plus I decided that instead of turning another year older, I will only turn 1/3 of a year older. So I’ll turn 24 & 2/3 on Sunday. Maybe that’s why I love the kid so much!