Wednesday, October 9, 2013

Early Wake-Up Call . . .

My phone rang at 6:53 this morning.  My phone always rings at 6:53 a.m. on October 9 – Mom and Dad are on the other end of the line to sing Happy Birthday to me at the exact time that I was born.  Many of you read my birthday wish a couple of years ago to keep receiving these calls, and thanks to your support, modern medicine, and the grace of God, they continue.

But because of our Grand Canyon hike a month ago, this is the first year Mon and Dad have been in Tucson on my birthday – and 6:53 a.m. in Ohio is 3:53 a.m. in Arizona.  So yesterday I sent a text to Dad and encouraged them to wait to call me until 6:53 a.m. in their time zone.  A couple of minutes later, the response came that they had already set two alarm clocks to make sure they were on the phone at the proper time.  And I have to admit that it wouldn’t have been the same otherwise.

For years, I shared my birthday with my friend Bob Campbell – he had already used it 29 times before sharing it with me.  Every year, we made a point of finding each other at some point during the day to wish each other a Happy Birthday.  Bob died a few years ago, but this morning I remembered his 55th birthday – his wife and friends were throwing him a surprise birthday party and asked me to come up with a gag gift similar to the Golden Buckeye Card that gives discounts to senior citizens in Ohio.  So I did, and they presented him with the Golden Double-Nickel Card, with the tag line “For Those Ten Glorious Years Between Old Age and Retirement” . . .

At age 26, I thought that was pretty funny.  Still do, but now there’s a difference – today, I qualify . . .

6 comments:

  1. Does this mean you'll be going out to eat your evening meal around 4 pm from now on? LOL!!!
    Hope you've had a glorious day!

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  2. Have a wonderful day -- you have already received the very best gift of all.

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  3. Happy Birthday, Greg! My Mom calls me at my birth time, too! Only problem I ever had is that she used to call me at 8:15 a.m. when I was the daughter born at 1:15 p.m. It's always been a bit confusing because my sister is the worst birthday present I ever got. Yep, she arrived at 8:15 on the morning of my second birthday. Hoping your day is winding down as wonderfully as it began. nise in Michigan

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  4. I just hit the big 6-0 a few weeks ago. Which qualified me for the first-Wednesday-of-the-month "senior citizen discount" at our big grocery chain. It was painful for me to sign up . . . but it did save me $5 the first time I used it. :-)

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  5. Happy belated!! That's a fun tradition :) Our family does good to call each other actually on the person's birthday instead of the next day :)

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