Birthday Wishes
by Jennifer Lang

As soon as my Mom called, I knew what she was going to say. It was early August, a few weeks before my birthday, and I had been avoiding the conversation. “I’ve been meaning to ask you,” she said, “What do you want for your 41st? You haven’t said anything yet.” 

She knew I kept a running list with at least one or two requests: a funky wallet, pearl hoop earrings, red leather backpack.

“There’s something I wish you could get for me,” I said feeling the tears begin to form. “But I know you can’t.” This year I was list-less.

Our three children were in France visiting their paternal grandparents, and my husband Philippe and I were still home in New York. Benjamin left in early July, Daniella and Simone in late July. Our plan was to leave for France mid-August and for Israel two weeks later to celebrate our son Benjamin becoming a Bar Mitzvah. Slowly, tears slid down my cheeks.

“I can’t imagine going to Israel next month if the war’s still going on. But it’s not even that. The kids are just so far away. It feels really scary to be a parent right now.”

My mom tried to comfort me. But there was little she or anyone else could say or do to change the world’s state of affairs. 

For my upcoming birthday I wanted to feel safe, which just doesn’t come wrapped in a box.

Since the war in Israel started a few weeks ago, I had been battling with nighttime awakenings. After tiptoeing to the bathroom to empty my bladder, I crawl back to bed in hopes of falling back asleep. But, my mind starts playing games with me – luring me to the land of what-ifs and god forbids. What if our plane crashes? God forbid war in Israel continues. Things I don’t dare mention during daylight hours wrap themselves around my brain like octopus tentacles. Images of September 11 flood my mind and headlines about Middle East missiles make it impossible for me to relax. Knowing it’s too early to begin my day, I return to the bathroom and grope around my medicine cabinet for something to lull me back to sleep. Anything to take the edge off.

I wasn’t always like this. A native of the San Francisco Bay Area, I met and married my dream-come-true Frenchman in Israel 16 years earlier. Since then, we have lived in Israel (where our brothers live), France (where my in-laws live), California (where my parents live) and New York. The fact of our family life is we have to take planes and traverse waters to see our families. In the summer we go east, and in winter, west.

This summer marked the first time all three of our children were old and independent enough to travel as unaccompanied minors across the Atlantic Ocean. Our goal was not only to give them uninterrupted time with their grandparents but also to immerse them in their French heritage.

Despite my all-American upbringing, France has played a central role in my life from learning French at age 6 to spending my junior year of college in Paris and then working there after graduation. Everything about the language, country and culture had seeped into my system, and I wanted my children to share in that, too.
 
When asked about our vacation plans, I was quick to respond, “This is what I’ve been waiting for, one of the reasons I married a Frenchman all those years ago.” Most people smiled and expressed their envy of our itineraries. But some simply could not understand. I could tell from the furrowed brow when they said, “Don’t you think they’re a little young to fly alone?” I shared the same concerns, but my commitment to raise French-speaking children guided me. A little voice whispered in my ear, reminding me of whom I married and one of the many reasons why.

I was excited for them. “Can you believe you’re big enough to take the plane with your sister?” I asked 7-year-old Simone, the only one of the three who has never traveled without us. “Have you told your friends about how you and Daniella get to go to camp in France when you’re at Mami and Papi’s house?” Simone smiled sweetly and nodded her head yes.

For Daniella it was a step up. Twice, she had flown to France accompanied only by her brother, but she’d never been in charge of a younger sibling. “I’ll help Simone make a little bed on the plane so she can sleep… And I’ll tell her if she can have Coke or not, just like Benjamin did with me last time.” Her eyes glowed with big-girl excitement.

As for Philippe and me, we had our own kid-free plans: re-finish hardwood floors, dinner with friends, mountain biking, maybe a weekend away. We would eat when hungry, sleep when tired and re-connect with our internal clocks.  

But the plan was not fail-safe. 

War in Israel erupted in July and escalated into August. Then a terrorist plot in London to attack planes en route to the United States unfolded. The reality that my kids were on one side of the ocean and we were on the other undid me. I cried at least once daily. If anyone asked me how the kids were doing without us, I cried. If a friend e-mailed me to ask if we were still planning on going to Israel for the bar mitzvah, I broke down. By the first week of August, I had no choice but to stop watching the news and forego reading the newspaper. In the car, I changed radio stations as soon as the hourly headlines came on. I was in a constant pre-menstrual state – highly emotional, with my hormones tipping from side to side, careening out of control.

Desperate to get a grip on my emotional health, I turned to my yoga mat, practicing five to six times a week. I got a full-body massage. I initiated sex with my spouse more often than not. And I made lists – of school supplies to buy, books to bring on our trip, friends to call. Yet nothing seemed to help. My tears were unstoppable.

“I think you should see somebody,” Philippe said one night after lovemaking when I started sobbing. He gently pulled his body off of mine. My post-coital crying jags were wearing him down.  “You need better coping skills.”

Usually a comment like that might strike me as critical. But this time I knew he was right. I agreed that when we returned from our trip I would add therapy to my list.

Still feeling emotionally fragile, I confided in one of my girlfriends. An upbeat and levelheaded mother of four, Lisa was feeling overwhelmed with her aging father facing open-heart surgery alone.

“How can you talk about your dad without crying?” I asked Lisa. It was the day before Philippe and I were due to leave for France. “How come you’re so strong and I’m not?”

“Here’s what I’ve learned lately. Someone told me to confront my deepest fears, to say them out loud and then be as proactive as possible,” she said. “If you’re lucky, it might make you feel some control, even though you really don’t have any. So just say it.”

“I’m scared to.” 

“Try.”

I took a breath. “Here goes. Philippe and I are going to get on that plane tomorrow for France and some terrorist is going to blow it up. We’re going to die and our kids will be at their grandparents waiting, but we’ll never get there.” My voice was shaky and the tears were flowing. Release.

“OK. So what do you need to do before you leave in case that happens?” I told Lisa about our outdated guardianship papers. “So fix them. What else?” 

What else? Wasn’t that enough to damage one’s psyche? I was going crazy, as if my insides were going to explode from stress, nerves, world news. I regretted opening Pandora’s box when I voiced my fears to my mom a couple of weeks ago.

“Everyone keeps saying that Jerusalem is so safe right now and not to go north to Haifa. I say it’s a great time to attack. We’re going to get to Israel and be bombed in a bus or at a café in Jerusalem. Even if the Hizbollah stops attacking Israel, Hamas will start in. It’s a perfect opportunity for them to wipe Israel off the map once and for all.” Lisa handed me a box of tissues. “Everyone keeps telling me how brave we are to go, but I don’t feel brave at all. I’m so scared inside.” Release again. My deepest, blackest fears being shared, unburdened. Ahhh.

“Okay. But do you know that statistically you have a greater chance of dying in a car accident here than being hit by a rocket or a bomb there?” I knew. I’d heard those stats before. As much as I disliked the sheer rationality of what she was saying, I nodded my head yes.

“Can you do anything about those fears?” Lisa asked. I shook my head no.

But it almost didn’t matter if I could do anything about my fears. It was a relief not to hold them all in. As for my need to control everything, even the uncontrollable, I understood what Lisa was saying: it was time to grow up, to let go. There was nothing I could do about war in the Middle East, terrorism in Israel or terrorist plots to blow up airplanes. And the last thing I wanted was for any of those random acts of violence to wield their power over me or to change the face of our family life. We were who we were, with family spread across three continents, and I wanted to continue to fly over oceans to see them.

My parents had internalized this conviction long ago. I had heard it growing up. If someone asked them why they were going to Israel with the bus bombs, the street knifings or the chemical weapons, they always responded, “There’s never a perfect time to travel. But you can’t live your life out of fear or you won’t live.”

Lisa and I hugged each other and I went home to finish packing. I updated our guardianship paperwork.  I also went shopping. I had an errand to do that had been on my mind for days. At Educational Warehouse, I headed straight for the game aisle.

“Do you need help?” asked a clerk who had followed me.

“My kids have been begging me to get Blokus, and I think it’s time.” It’s a hot new strategy board game that everyone seems to be playing.

I turned over the box to see the $30 price tag. “Wow, I never buy them such expensive games unless there’s an occasion,” I muttered mostly to myself. With the game in hand, I headed toward the cashier. The purchase appealed to my irrational, superstitious self. The one who believes that buying a board game will ensure our personal safety; if it waits for us at home then we have to return intact. And when I think about lounging on the living room carpet in pajamas playing a game with all my kids and their craziness on a Friday night, I realize it really is the perfect gift – for my birthday.

Jennifer Lang splits her time between freelance writing for magazines, writing her own stories, teaching yoga and playing Mom/Wife. A native of northern California, she and her French husband live in White Plains, NY with their three school-aged kids, who always ask her why she doesn't just write a book already. Over the past decade, her work has appeared in Alternative Medicine, Parenting, Parents, American Baby, Real Simple, Woman's Day and Car & Travel magazines, the San Francisco Chronicle and online at www.ducts.org. She is deeply indebted to a few writing mentors who have encouraged her to be more daring, find her voice and share it. The story "Simone" is based on a journal of her third pregnancy that she was commissioned to keep for BabyCenter in 1999.

Previous page

Back to Table of Contents

Next page