It makes me happy and I hope she is here to stay. I can almost hear her saying one of her often used phrases, “Now, this I like.” I feel her presence in and around our home a lot lately. It’s gorgeous - full of lilies, roses, peonies, spiderwort, echinacea and a budding vegetable garden and lots and lots of birds who enjoy it as much as we do. We’ve been in our house for just over a year so this is the first spring that the yard is feeling like “our” yard. Lately, I find myself thinking of her more and more. “Us Geminis have to stick together,” she used to say. She seemed to like that we had that in common. Her birthday was in June and she was a Gemini just like me. That happens a lot when I think about her. Just now, I caught myself smiling as I was typing. I don’t know that I’d be the feminist I am without her influence. She was strong and independent, smart and resourceful, curious and open. She basically raised me from the time I was 9 til 13 and even before and after she was a big part - an everyday part - of my life. She was a huge part of my life and a wonderful influence on me. I tend to write a lot about Busia which makes sense because I think about her so much. And I hope a birthday never passes without hearing it. All I do know is that not a single birthday has passed without hearing Busia’s voice either in person or now, in my head, singing those birthday songs. Did it begin when my mom was little? I really don’t know. Was it part of her family’s tradition? When she was growing up they most likely would have sung in Polish, so probably not. It’s one of the thousand things I wish I had asked Busia. I don’t remember a time that we didn’t sing three songs. I have no idea how that tradition started. We weren’t making fun of Busia - we all adored her - it was just that it was practically a race to get all of those songs out before the candles were simply puddles of wax atop the cake. It became a joke between my brothers and me. Yes, in my family there was not one, but three birthday songs sung as the candles burned. Of course, that was the song that kicked things off, but immediately upon the end of that one, Busia’s voice would chime out the start of another:īut don’t blow out those candles just yet! There was always one more coming, this one sung along to the tune of Happy Birthday: In my family, Happy Birthday was not the only song sung when the candles were lit on the cake. While I didn’t celebrate with a traditional cake and candles (I opted for pie instead), I was smiling as I remembered the way that Busia used to sing Happy Birthday. My 43rd birthday was just this past Monday.
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