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The One Time I Wouldn’t Have Preferred the Money
The gift they surprised me with this year
I have a big birthday coming up, and if experience is anything to go by, I could end up knee-high in oddly coloured socks.
I’d prefer the money.
With each circumnavigation of the sun, I feel as though there is some passing change, but everything looks the same. The same people turn up to wish me ‘Happy Birthday!’ My wife, my kids (one on Zoom), relations, and a few friends, as reminded by a Facebook notification.
I made it clear. I didn’t want a big party. Not like that last one. Friends, relations, colleagues, cleaners, foreigners, kitchen sinks, and the like, turned up at our local hotel with chocolates and Champagne — which they ate and drank. I spent more time guilt-buying drinks at the bar than being in the company of my family.
This year, I booked a lodge. It’s got three bedrooms and a jacuzzi.
We leave on Friday to meet up with №2 and №3 sons and their beautiful girlfriends. Me and my family. Food and wine. Games and guffaws.
I booked dinner for the six of us on Saturday night at The View restaurant, don’t all restaurants have a view? I had to change it to eight people when my sister and her hubby said they’d pop along as well.
