Birthday Story #1

We bought Ed a Leatherman for his birthday. When I say "we," I mean Tom. And "we" bought him two cakes from Mrs. Backer's Bakery. Tom went into buy the first cake while I sat in the car.

Hey, I'm a cripple.

"Welcome" was written on the cake in frosting, because Ed and his family had just come into town from Pittsburgh. We played a board game and then met Charles and Erica at Ruth's Diner where we waited an hour and a half to be seated, and then we left and went to Trio's where we waited five minutes. It was late when we finished, so we never got around to eating the cake.

I ate it mostly by myself over the next few days.

Then on Ed's actual birthday, "we" bought a second cake at Mrs. Backer's Bakery, and again, I sat in the car while Tom went in.

"What did you have them write on the cake?" I asked when he returned.

"Welcome," he said.

"Welcome? It's his birthday. Why not Happy Birthday?"

"I'm tired and I wasn't thinking." Of course, he was tired. He'd been schlepping around all day looking for the right birthday present for Ed: the Leatherman.

When we got home, I took the Leatherman to wrap it and decided to write Ed a birthday note directly on the wrapping paper with India Ink. Here's the note:

If you ever get your arm stuck in a slot canyon, this Leatherman will allow you to cut yourself loose without any trouble at all. It's sharp. It's not one of those cheap ones that takes an hour to cut through the flesh. You'll be able to whack it off with a neat clean seam. In fact, my advice to you is don't spend days drinking your own pee - (that's just so embarrssing). Cut your arm off first thing while you have enough water left to climb out of there. And for heaven sake, don't take a lot of film footage of yourself, because it's just not fun to listen to a lot of whining. Just keep it to yourself.

Do you even know where that slot canyon is? My advice is stay in the city. Use this tool for a mugger. Better to cut someone else, then to be cut yourself, I always say.

Hope you had a wonderful birthday that did not include any mutilations. Much love. You've been a wonderful son, although we weren't always aware of it.

Mom (and Dad)

So Ed published the letter on his blog noting that I take all the credit and put Dad's name in parenthesis, when Dad actually bought the knife and the cakes etc. etc. etc.

See, for me, it's a point-of-view problem. Who is the "I" in this note? My mistake was changing to the plural "we" in the last paragraph remembering the parenthetical (Dad) and all of his sacrifices for the day in question.

Or my mistake was not being generous enough to take parenthetical Dad out of the parenthesis.

Welcome.