My Birthday in Boston

Listening to the first season of Serial, which relies on 15-year old memories got me thinking--how would I fare? I started with an easy one, my birthday 8 and a half years ago. If you asked the 15 members of the high school trip who celebrated my 16th birthday what happened, every one would offer a different story, perhaps some long, but more likely many would be bereft of detail. Here's my take.

A little background: every first week of March, my high school ceased its regular schedule of classes for a week of discovery outside the burdensome shackles of the classroom. Called Crescite Week—literally translated from the vocative case in Latin as, “you, grow!”—there were a wide range of activities offered and my experiences ran the gamut (all of which were paid for out of my own pocket!) And with my birthday falling on the 3rd of March, I celebrated birthdays in Boston, a tiny town in Northern Spain, and in the dirty confines of Cocoa Expo, Florida. Every experience was unique, each with its own story.

While at home, I always got to choose my dinner—bratwurst and apple cake—but on these trips, I was at the mercy of whichever teacher or coach was in charge, along with the budget of the trip (often main meals were included in the price of each trip). And though my birthday was never forgotten, the results varied dramatically.

My sophomore year, I participated in a road trip dubbed “East Coast Travels,” from Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater to the slopes of Killington in Vermont. In between, was a blizzard on the highway to Pittsburgh, a pizza party at my grandparents’ upper West-side flat in NYC and my birthday in Boston, where I strutted around proudly in my brand-new New York Yankees sweatshirt and slightly older and raggedy New York Yankees knit cap—both of which I still wear almost nine years later!

After spending the afternoon touring Harvard’s campus and walking briefly on the Freedom Trail, we found ourselves sitting down for dinner, after being greeted by the traditional, we don’t serve Yankees fans here! Thirteen bedraggled boys aged 14-17 and two adults at their wits end in a small mood-lit, family-owned, one-room Italian restaurant. Imagine the pain on the other diners’ faces and multiply it by 10 and you’ll get an idea of the looks which bored holes through the backs of our heads, but we didn’t care; this was the best meal of the entire trip! The teachers dutifully shared a bottle of wine.

As we finished our pasta dishes and chicken parmigiana (the veal was not in the budget), the lights dimmed, and there was a happy birthday sung by our group, punctuated with a very loud give that man a beer! by one of our own, much to the chagrin of the buttoned-down clientele out for a quiet evening.

The lights dimmed even more and Mr. C, the head of the trip, stood for a toast. He’d asked one of the older and more responsible among us, Paul, to pick up a small gift for me on our walk down the Freedom Trail. I was handed a folded white t-shirt, wrapped in newspaper, and instructed to unfurl it for the restaurant to see. There was a shocked silence, and jaws dropped across the room as I held the shirt in front me; then, a mumbled, but very audible oh shit from Mr. C as I looked down at the shirt. In large, blue, block-letters, it read, FRANCE SUCKS. 

Paul was handed the shirt and cash as he begrudgingly galloped back into the darkened street. Luckily the small shop was still open and he soon returned with another folded white t. Are you sure this is the right one? Mr. C asked Paul as I unfurled the shirt. Standing for all to see in my Yankees sweatshirt, my face as red as my hair, I held a shirt which read in large, blue, block-letters: YANKEES SUCK.

This time, the restaurant erupted in cheers, our boisterous transgressions forgiven.