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They Say It's Your Birthday – We're Gonna Have a Good Time by Sari Grandstaff
It was my daughter’s third birthday, and we had just moved to a new area. I was having those “first children’s party jitters” all over again. A home party was out of the question since our temporary quarters – a little bigger than my daughter’s dollhouse – were too cramped to fit even the Fisher Price® family of four, let alone twenty human three-year-olds.
I ended up booking the party at a child-friendly chain restaurant in the local mall. The restaurant featured a clown on Sunday afternoons who entertained with balloon animals and tricks. The staff was very reassuring and I heard many successful-party stories from the other nursery school mothers I was meeting in our new rural home.
When the day of the party finally arrived, my husband and I were at the restaurant early to decorate. Trying to make a “competent-yet-stylish mother” impression, I was wearing a rayon print, vintage jumpsuit that my mother had bought for me in a boutique. The mothers swooped in to drop off their children and immediately took off for a few peaceful hours of unimpeded mall shopping.
Food was served and the kids occupied themselves with party blowers. My husband kept checking with the manager to see when the clown was arriving, but the only person who tumbled in with enough makeup to qualify was a grande dame who had just come from a makeover at the department store counter. She took one look at us and headed straight for the bar. Someone would have to rescue the party for the ruffle-bottomed princess.
I also had a six year old son, and having just moved from the New York metropolitan area, where children’s birthday parties are a competitive sport, I was a Play-o-Rena/Gymboree/Tumble Bee triple medalist.
Wouldn’t you know, our party table was set up in front of the big screen TV. All eyes in the crowded restaurant, at least all the men’s eyes, were glued to the game, when my alter ego – Mama the Llama, party entertainer extraordinaire – entered the center ring. Having survived a Passover afternoon at a Discovery Zone in a Hasidic Jewish community, I knew I could certainly lead my posse of 3 year olds through the Hokey-Pokey, Simon Says, Farmer in the Dell and Did You Ever See a Lassie. The restaurant patrons got to see a lassie going this way and that all right, not to mention my Head and Shoulders Knees and Toes. All without a safety net.
When uninvited little guests from other tables started coming over to join us, I knew I had stuck the landing. One gentleman was pointedly approaching our table. Was he going to be a party pooper and tell us to stop blocking the screen?
“Do you have a business card?” he asked me. “A business card?” I was bewildered. Had I eaten one too many fruit snacks in an attempt to keep my sugar level on par with the kids? “Yeah,” he continued, “our daughter’s birthday is coming up and you’re way better than the clown that’s usually here.”
The parents arrived to pick up their children and I gained estimation in the eyes of my new neighbors when they heard about the no-show. The restaurant staff was very apologetic and charged us practically nothing for the party.
My mother’s classic parenting advice to me has always been: “make plans and God laughs.” Ever since becoming a mother, when plans go awry, I have felt like the limbo stick is being lowered again, and I learn to bend backwards just a little more. This brings me down to my children’s eye level, and isn’t that the whole point after all?
Sari Grandstaff is a poet, freelance writer, and full-time mother of a 17 year old son, a 14 year old daughter, and a 7 year old son. Sari earned her law degree from Pace University School of Law, and she is currently a part-time graduate student in school library media studies at University at Albany. Sari's essays have been heard on several National Public Radio programs such as 51%, The Best of Our Knowledge, The Roundtable, and The Health Show. The self-proclaimed "haikuku bird of the Hudson Valley," Sari's haiku poetry has been published in Chronogram, Frogpond, The Nor'Easter, and Solares Hill.
Sari grew up in the suburbs of New York City in a non-traditional household, raised by lesbian mothers. They encouraged her writing career from early childhood by sending one of her stories off to be published in the local newspaper when Sari was in 4th grade and by clapping wildly when she read her poetry at her elementary school graduation. Although Sari passed the Bar Exam the first time, despite frequent bathroom breaks due to being eight months pregnant, she preferred bartending and continued working at her mothers' nightclub until she moved to the Mid-Hudson Valley. She lives with her husband of almost 19 years, and their three children, in the hippie stronghold of Woodstock, New York. Sari's writing is inspired by the surrounding Catskill Mountains, her mothers, her late father, and especially her husband and children. This piece is from her book-in-progress titled Paired Straight, about growing up somewhere between Heather Has Two Mommies and Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.
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