A Party Without Me

My oldest nephew's first born son, Spencer Jack, had his 1st birthday yesterday. Spencer Jack had a birthday party. And I was not invited. I can't tell you how badly this hurts my feelings. When Spencer Jack's dad had birthday parties I used to get invited.

Spencer Jack's Uncle Joey mentioned to me some time ago that he would need to consult with me as to how to make the type birthday presents I used to make for his birthday parties. It was a very elaborate process. Involving a lot of unwrapping and varying levels of difficulty and a big mess. One year it was glitter in balloons that had to be popped to find clues as to where the actual present was located. (the trunk of my car). And then when the package was hauled in from the trunk the new package started up a fresh mess of unwrapping with squeals of fun from the kids, groans of will this never end from the stodgy grownups.

Now the actual birthday present was always totally lame. It was the elaborate packaging that was the actual present. Now, one of my, well, sort of humorless and at times slightly clueless, yet self-righteously overbearing siblings felt, I guess, that I needed to be taught a lesson. I believe it was on my birthday, maybe it was Christmas, I don't remember. But she'd gone through a little bother to wrap something sort of remotely like I did for my nephews. When I got to what was inside it was a jar of peaches with a note saying "How does it feel now?" Or something like that. I guess this was supposed to teach me how awful it was to put my nephews through the extreme trauma of opening one of my birthday presents and end up causing them to be upset because I didn't buy them a video game. Trouble was, I like peaches so the lesson was totally lost on me.

Nonetheless, the peach incident was confusing to me. So when the next nephew birthday invite came along I politely declined the invitation, saying that I didn't want to upset my nephew with one of my awful birthday presents. I was then told it would break the boy's heart if I didn't do my usual birthday thing that was the highlight of their birthday parties. That would be the nephew who told me he needed to consult with me as to what to do for Spencer Jack's birthday party. I told him to wait a couple years, that Spencer Jack was too young for that type fun.

I wonder if the reason I didn't get invited to Spencer Jack's birthday party is because maybe his Grandma (it was she who sent me the pic above taken at Spencer Jack's party) told Spencer Jack's mother what a nightmare it was to clean up after one of my birthday presents. I remember the year the package exploded shooting thousands of those little circles you make with a paper punch, apparently she was finding those paper punches for months. I recollect hearing that the glitter from the popped balloons had been a gift that kept on giving too.

I will admit, all these years later, part of the fun was watching my sister-in-law, a certified neat freak, squirm as she saw the mess unfold. Of course when it was all over I'd help the nephews pick it all up. But you can't easily pick up glitter and paper punches.

Anyway, Happy Birthday Spencer Jack. Sorry I couldn't be at your party.