The Eras Tour

I’m writing this piece on the train home to Toronto. The slight wafts of greasy breakfast sandwiches and hangover sweat tell me I had a very different weekend than other passengers. Instead of a St. Paddy’s pub crawl, I celebrated my grandfather’s eightieth birthday.

The party wasn't his idea. Had he known the scope of the affair, he would have vehemently revolted against it.

My grandfather is not one to make a fuss. In his eighty years, he has never missed a flight, left a gas tank less than half full, or - he told me with disdain - sung karaoke. Almost too predictably, he ruined the surprise by showing up to his party forty minutes early.

Throughout the evening, rowdy octogenarians and family members played farcical trivia at his expense. What’s older, my grandfather or a microwave? What’s more likely, that he’s stolen something, or lied to law enforcement?

His remaining high school friends artfully dodged answering requests for embarrassing stories. Instead, they shared knowing glances (and several drinks) at the centre table.

We’ve known each other since we were twelve, they told my youngest cousin and brother. About your age.

The two grimaced and retreated into the far corners of the restaurant. At eleven, neither particularly cares to chat with the adults in the room. They don’t yet grasp how impressive it is to maintain a friendship over decades. To them, it is inevitable that their best friends will come to their eightieth birthdays, too.

Me convincing myself that I love ageing.

My cousin, in particular, is on the awkward precipice of teenagedom. She shifts from cowering behind her parents to giving them the finger at record speed.

My mom and I took her shopping before the party. There are few places that cater to the tween crowd, and we watched her pick up koala pyjamas in a store that also sold club wear. Mixed in with her selections of sweaters and floral-print shorts were mini skirts and deep v-necks.

I don’t care what my mom thinks she muttered while trying on a dress with cutouts.

I gave my mom a glance. This is a mother-daughter dynamic we’d never want to go back to.

When I was a kid, my shopping days were reserved for my grandmother. We spent up to eight hours hitting every store in the mall, often splurging on items I could wear with her to the theatre.

One can never have too many dresses, she would say, and I would spin stories of where, precisely, I would debut my newest frock. My mother’s approval was always a nice-to-have, not a need-to-have.

Our shopping years lasted well into my twenties. On visits home, I would look forward to a day out with grandma - complete with lunch and dinner if it took that long. My favourite pink coat is a relic of one of our last outings. It reminds me of when seeing her was filled with finding something new.

Now our time is spent rehashing what she’s forgotten.

An hour before my grandfather’s party, I told her where we were going. Thirty minutes before, I told her again. Fifteen, and she couldn’t remember where we were going. On the drive, she wasn’t sure why we were going to lunch when we could have just stayed home.

During the event, she sat next to her friend from high school. They giggled as my grandfather’s boisterous classmate flirted with them. Two replaced knees and one misplaced memory did nothing to pale his enthusiasm. Neither, it seemed, did the mess of food on my grandmother’s upper lip or dishevelled wisps of her hair.

My cousin, I realized, would only ever remember this version of her.

My grandmother, I thought, would never know any of us beyond this age.

Somewhere between eleven and eighty, the rest of us linger in small clouds of stress. We are the parents, the caregivers, and the workers. We scuttle through the crowd watching the scene with a sense of fear. There are already empty seats for friends who did not make it this far in life. How many of these do we get left with the eldest generation?

I am newly baptized into this group. As the only millennial family member, I have spent my years flipping from the kid's table to the adult seats. Now, with a new mortgage over my head and a ring on my finger, the choice has been made. I am firmly planted and fully grown.

Now I notice the ways ageing has caught us all off guard. I watched one uncle refer to the other as his red-haired brother, only to remember that he is grey. I saw my grandparent’s friends unsure where to place me in their memory. Surely I’m not the same twelve-year-old they met way back when. We have all changed - seemingly overnight - and are getting used to the dynamics. As soon as we do, they will likely shift again.

I mused about the different groups at the party while watching my grandfather carry his caesar from table to table. He was not-so-secretly loving the whole ordeal.

At his request, we took a series of photos to capture the evening. One with his friends, one with the grandkids, and another with the whole family. He reminded us multiple times to send the photos through email and not Facebook.

We should print them out, he said, for your grandmother.

And I thought, for the first time at a family function, that I would like to print a copy, too. If only to remember this era before we graduate into the next.

Happy 80th birthday, grandpa!