A 95th Birthday Party ~ and Taking A Stand

Last Sunday, April 6th, my husband turned NINETY-FIVE! Pretty terrific, wouldn’t you say?

Bill was eighty when we met and married.

I’ve been planning his surprise birthday party for weeks and weeks.

“You’re not going to have a party for me, are you? You know I don’t want one…”
“Darling, I’ve tried, but nobody can come…I’m so sorry…but you’ll have your Santa Cruz grandsons…and friends can come…and let’s hope this summer we can arrange visits…”
“Perfect. No party!!!”

Sunday, after a long phone call in the back garden, walking down the hall, sauntering through our kitchen approaching the living room, Grandpa stopped, bedazzled to see the space thick with people!

His son from Peru (Cameron’s father)…son and grandson from Connecticut… son, daughter-in-law, granddaughter, grandson-in-law, great-granddaughter from Portland…daughter from New York…grandson from Paris…granddaughter from L.A…two scarce Santa Cruz grandsons…

His four children together for the first time in years.

I was all set to tell you about what I did most of last week—grocery and decorations shopping, renting party pieces, fretting over whether there really was space to comfortably seat twenty-four in our living room—and of the party itself.

Then up popped a note from The New York Times about Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia’s miserable news: The Supreme Court blocked a trial judge’s order directing the United States to return this Salvadoran migrant it had inadvertently deported.

The young man was sent to prison in El Salvador on the basis of his wearing ‘a Chicago Bulls hat and hoodie’ and a ‘confidential informant claiming he belonged to a clique in New York—a place he has never lived.’ *

Judge Roberts’s sole ruling was based on wanting to give the full court ‘breathing room’ to consider the case.
What is there to consider?
Judge Roberts seems to fret that if judges thwart intentions of The Powers that Be, well, sir, who knows what judges might decide in future…?

I was stunned.

Bill’s ninety-fifth birthday party suddenly didn’t seem such a much.
Except it is.
Because Family is one cherished entitlement we are granted The King’s minions cannot take from us.
So far.

Now suddenly all I find important is that no matter how much time it takes, no matter how much in coin or strength it may cost, no matter what tussle there might be among family members and a friend here and there, taking a stand is worth it.

Essential.

Every night Bill and I listen to attorney-law-professor Joyce Vance’s Civil Discourse on Substack—our treat after Wordle. And every night Joyce reminds us we must be advocates for democracy. Joyce writes:

“If it can happen to Abrego Garcia, it can happen to any of us. He saw no judge before he was deported, had no opportunity to plead his case that what was happening to him wasn’t permitted…”**

Now as the quality of our lives is threatened—many lives have already been sorely affected–we must work to preserve its beautiful everydayness. In the light of what happened to Abrego Garcia, an old man’s birthday party may seem frivolous. But it’s part of what we must never relinquish…the liberty of bringing family and friends together to celebrate life—and one another.

So next when you’re thinking about planning a party to celebrate someone dear to you–for, say, one to two dozen, you might consider this menu…at almost-ninety, it did not exhaust me. It was, in fact, fun.

Once when I asked Bill what I could make for his birthday supper, he said “Macaroni and cheese. Oh, and some sausages.”
On the page of Mrs. Rombauer’s Joy of Cooking*** “Baked Macaroni and Cheese,” I’d  written: “Bill: ‘best he ever ate!” For twenty-four, I made it for three pounds of Italian Penne Rigate (Trader Joe’s). Baked it in three large shallow baking dishes (so the crumb topping will brown).

For his sausages, I chose to make Lidia Bastianich’s “Sausage and Peppers—Salsiccia con Peperoni.”** I bought ten pounds of chicken Italian sausages. Browned the sausages the night before, that helped—I’d planned to make the whole dish then, but couldn’t. Early the afternoon of the party, I prepped the onions, garlic, red and yellow sweet peppers, mushrooms, and fiery small red peppers, layered them through the sausages in our inherited monster Le Creuset oval baking dish…then into the portable turkey-size electric oven I bought years ago—the one that rescues me during the holidays. So the three mac and cheese baking dishes went into our stove’s oven.

I bought six baguettes of French bread at Companion Bakeshop at eight o’clock Sunday morning. Set two with a bread knife on each of the three tables.

Salad could not have been simpler and was my favorite I’ve made in ages—Arugula and Sunflower Shoots. The latter I’d never tasted, found them at our organic market, and was entranced. The texture—sweet crunchy shoots with delicate bitter leaves—was perfect counterpoint to substantial sausage and peppers and rich mac and cheese. If you can’t find sunflower shoots at a market, there are directives online for sprouting one’s own—they are, apparently, the seeds of “black oil sunflowers.” Salad was served in a huge farmer’s mixing bowl I bought at a roadside market between Boston and West Groton in a former lifetime.
No sprouts? I’d make it with half arugula, one quarter each red and green lettuces. Balsamic vinaigrette dressing.

For the birthday cake, I was going to make a double recipe of my Fresh Ginger Cake in my The Birthday Cake Book, but it’s best the day of baking and I realized there wouldn’t be time or oven space to make it Sunday. So I splurged and went to The Buttery (where our wedding cake was baked), and ended with a quarter-sheet of Strawberry Shortcake—whipped cream-frosted white chiffon cake filled with sliced fresh strawberries. Perfect. With the cake there was a big bowl of whole fresh local strawberries and another of a pint of sweetened whipped cream.

Sauvignon blanc, assorted reds from our bin in the garage which we’ve been saving, lots of sparkling water, and for toasts, a French champagne courtesy of Costco.

Half a dozen close Santa Cruz friends surprised Bill even further.
It was a super party.
Much of family is still here, such a treat for Bill. Cameron’s dad and Cameron spent yesterday washing up. So dear and helpful.
Others are across the street at the children’s playground with four year-old fairy-tale-beautiful Quinn…
Uschi is in Pig Heaven with four strong young men to walk her.

And last night I finally found Bill’s birthday presents in my study.

Life in Santa Cruz, Park Division.

But the main thing…the main main thing…is that each of us decides the time has come to demonstrate our conviction in our American birth right.
That we fight the heartless self-serving forces bolstering a would-be dictator attempting to destroy our democracy.

It’s a scary new world. But still it is ours.

Funny how the timing of an old guy’s birthday party can set things in perspective, eh?

*The New York Times: April 7, 2025 “Supreme Court Temporarily Blocks Order Requiring Return of Wrongly Deported Migrant”
**joycevance.substack.com
***Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker, Ethan Becker: Joy of Cooking. New York: Scribner, 2006, page 326.
****Lidia Matticchio Bastianich: Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2001, page 242.