My cousin and I grew up, married, had kids, but come Chanukah we’d still pose like chassan and kallah with a birthday cake

M y birthday falls out around Chanukah.

When I was a kid I thought that meant bundled presents. That doesn’t sound so bad in theory: Take the price of two gifts combine it and you get one BIG gift like an American Girl doll. (I know kids get them regularly today but growing up we had to be happy with the catalog — I knew ONE person who owned one.) But as I got older and wiser I realized that no that’s not what actually happened: I got one gift and was told it was for both.

I don’t totally blame my parents for this: Buying gifts isn’t rocket science it’s harder. If they could find an excuse and get away with it good for them. I was sorry for me though. Then there was the party issue: Everyone is in Chanukah spirit already they don’t need an excuse like my birthday to have a great time.

Don’t feel sorry for me yet — that’ll come soon.

There was one glorious bright spot of my Chanukah birthday. Every year at my maternal grandparents’ party there would be an ice cream cake to celebrate my birthday. It was always the same cake from the Ice Cream Center on 13th Avenue. Vanilla on top chocolate on bottom cookie crumbs separating the two. It was decorated with plastic roses one pink one blue. Piped in gel was Happy Birthday Esther and Raphael. Yup I had to share it with my cousin born ten days after me. I didn’t mind really because I don’t think we would have celebrated if it were just me. And he was a boy so there was no competition just the pink rose for me and the blue rose for… well he didn’t care about the blue rose. One year my younger cousin took the pink rose for herself. I can still access the horror of that loss. Serious childhood trauma here.

To me this was Chanukah: birthdays ice cream cakes and taking toothy-grinned pictures next to my cousin.

This went on for many years. My cousin and I grew up married had kids but come Chanukah we’d still pose like chassan and kallah with a birthday cake. And then two years ago something happened.

I remember too clearly where I stood in my aunt and uncle’s home in Monsey near the bay window where the menorahs were displayed — I can feel the horror and protest rising like bile in my throat — they brought out the birthday cake Esther and Raphael like always and then added on was written: Mutti.

“Who’s Mutti?” I demanded. My cousin’s fairly new husband smiled jovially in my direction.

“It’s his birthday around now too ” my uncle said.

I scowled.

My sister Malky piped up. “In that case my Yaakov Mordechai should be on there his birthday is now too.”

I shot her a look. Traitor!

And then other cousins raised their voices. Their spouses and kids had December birthdays, too, and should be included in the festivities. I glowered at Mutti. Even though I knew he was innocent and none of this was his idea, it was still his birthday.

“Who spells Mutti with an i,” I said in a nasty tone.

He shrugged. “I do.”

Shucks, couldn’t intimidate him.

And while I sulked, and moped, while I felt usurped and forgotten, I was also talking to myself. “Esther — you big baby! It’s a birthday cake that everyone was sharing anyway. Who cares if there are more names on it!”

But I did care. This was me and my cousin’s thing (though he didn’t seem to give a hoot). And all these new people were showing up and taking it for their own.

We took a picture of all the birthday people. I made sure to take one with just my cousin Raphael. Petty, I know. Please try not to judge me.

I grumped to my husband the whole way home. He was kind to me, even though he was probably rolling his eyes when I wasn’t looking.

Come the next year before the Chanukah party, my mother mentioned she was buying two ice cream cakes because the family had gotten so big.

“One is for me and Raphael, and the other is for everyone else,” I said too firmly.

My mother laughed, humoring my immaturity. “Yes, ma’am.”

Once again my memory is too clear. I know where I sat, toward the end of the table, facing my aunt and uncle’s breakfront containing all the unique pieces my uncle brought home from his business trips in the Far East. They brought out the cakes, a new flavor that year, ice cream donut cakes covered in a rich chocolate ganache. I co-opted one cake, taking charge of the cutting and serving because it was my cake, after all.

“Sing for me and Raphael,” I half-joked to those around us. And then I posed for our requisite picture.

All the other birthdays were celebrated, and feted. I ignored them.

Still the same talk in my head: immature, and petty, and stupid, I knew, but this was mine, this was my childhood, and it was just being taken away. Give it a few more years and it would become: “We always have ice cream cake at the Goldberg Chanukah party, I don’t know why, they’ve just been doing it for years.”

“At least you’re not Elchonon,” my husband told me on the way home. Elchonon is my oldest.

“Huh?” I didn’t follow.

“Aleph Elul. That’s between school and camp. There’s no one to naturally celebrate with, he’s just stuck with us. At his bar mitzvah he’ll invite his rebbi from the previous year who is days away from starting a new year with a new class.”

“Ah,” I said. I hate perspective.

This year’s Chanukah party is coming up soon. At the very least, I am the oldest one celebrating a birthday (I am ten days older than Raphael, after all). I’ll try to embrace a mass happy birthday singing. As I cut the cake, I’ll wink at my son, try to behave, and tell myself that if I’m one year older, I should at least try to be one year wiser.

(Originally featured in Family First Issue 571)