It started innocently enough.
Several weeks into December, and after an unsatisfying
encounter of the politicl Facebook kind, one in which a man in his early 20s
proffered the “known fact” that Minneapolis was the home of “people who hate
America”, I became concerned that I was too readily find-able.
“I’m going off the grid,” I told Mary.
“Hmmm,” Mary offered.“You do realize you have the kind of last name that people believe
you’ve created just for its Scrabble possibilities, yes?”
It’s true.My last
name, a hyphenated concoction thought in some circles to be a Klingon
declaration of love, is unique.Richly, densely,
even drunkenly unique.
But I was on a roll.
“I blocked him,” I said,“And I think I should change my birthday, too.I mean, even if he can remember half the
name, I want to make sure he doesn’t…”
I trail off.
“Doesn’t what,” Mary prods.“Send you a birthday card?See if you’re compatible on one of those
Chinese animal zodiac things?”Mary
chuckles softly to herself.
“Hey, now,” I say.
“Wait, wait,” she says.I hear her move the phone from one ear to the other.“Maybe he’s thinking of adding you to his
Friends and Family bundle, get ya a good deal on an extra phone line.”
There is a thudding sound, and I know without asking that
she’s just fallen off her chair and is laying on her back, tears of laughter in
her bright blue eyes.
I sigh.
There is no end to my suffering.
I let her work her way through her enjoyment, and in no
time at all she is coherent again.
“Changing your birthdate is a dumb idea,” she says..”Just remove it.”
Oddly enough, however, I could not figure out how to
remove my birthdate.
In the end, I simply changed it to January 1, 1905.
1905.
I received over 130 posts, texts, and offers of gin and
tonics on New Years Day, all filled with warm messages of love and dismay that
they’d never noticed before that I had been born on New Year’s Day, which I had
not.
Most disturbingly of all, however, was that no one
mentioned how good I looked for having just turned 110.
Welcome to the new year, everyone. I’ve missed you.