'Celebrating you on your special day'

 

    Modern life is jammed with decisions. Do this, buy that. Or don't do that, don't buy this. Being married, my wife and I typically make decisions together. In the past, big decisions — buying a condo; having children. Lately, small decisions.
     A friend of her family, Bobby, turned 100 over the weekend. He was a classmate of her mother's —used to dip her pigtails in the inkwell, he used to say. There was a party, at his apartment in Arlington Heights. A card seemed in order. The Hallmark shop in Northbrook closed long ago — sending cards is not the thing it used to be, I suppose. So we went to Osco, which has a wide selection of cards.

     The birthday section offers age-specific cards, intended for children turning 1, 2, 3, and such. We speculated, as we hunted, whether there would be a "So you're 100!" card. My  hunch was there would not be — think of how small that market is. But there it was. An elegant-yet-lighthearted, gold-lettered card —you wouldn't want something too jokey, or too serious, or leering. I examined it.

      "This one is pretty," my wife said, showing me another card, cheerful, arty, with cut-outs of balloons. A nice card. But also, I felt, a missed opportunity.
     "How often do you get the chance?" I said, making the case for the 100 years card in my hands. My view carried the day, and we bought the card. My wife had me make copies of two photos of Bobby and his wife, posing with her parents and other friends, at some long-ago occasion, maybe 60 years ago, and we tucked them in the card.

     The tough part about decisions is there are usually multiple factors involved, and you can't consider everything, try though you might. My wife, sharper than me, saw the problem minutes later, in the car.

     "I wonder how many people will buy that exact card?" 

     Produced by American Greetings, it was probably in every Osco in the city. 

     We arrived at the party. I could not resist looking about and noticing three of our card's distinctive blue envelopes, piled atop gifts. And two more on the piano. Plus one identical card that had already been opened. And ours. Making seven in plain sight. No doubt more elsewhere.

     No big harm. Repetition is a key part of growing old, routines you cherish, and those you don't. The birthday boy and his family may have even had a laugh over the seven identical cards. That's a present in itself.