Birthday boy

Posted on October 1, 2006
Filed Under chancers, characters, death, family, history, relationships, review, Shout Out, the future | 3 Comments

It’s my birthday today and I supposedly share it with nine million other people on planet Earth. What can I say…

Happy birthday to you
May you live in interesting times
May you live a happy and prosperous life

Just after midnight on a Friday morning thirty mumble years ago, my mother gave birth to me. She laughs about it now (the experience, not me!) but, by her own admission, she was quite naive about childbirth. All the women in her ward talked about ‘the cup of tea’ one received after the birth of one’s child. My mother was expecting a nurse to walk into the ward, carrying a silver tray, on which the cup of tea lay, and present it to her in a quasi-religious ceremony. Maybe it was the midnight hour, maybe it was an urban myth, but she never got her cup of tea. Her next child, my only brother, was born in a different hospital!

It could be argued I’m a Dublin cockney. To be a cockney in London means to be born within the sound of the bells of St. Mary Le Bow, Cheapside. The Coombe Hospital is within earshot of Christchurch and, considering the midnight hour, perhaps I did answer the call of the bells of Christchurch! I never did grow a moustache though!

Since I’m halfway through the three score and ten, here’s a partial list of people who were born and died today…
Born
1207 King Henry III of England
1471 King Frederick I of Denmark
1685 Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor
1730 Richard Stockton, signer of the (USA) Declaration of Independence
1881 William Boeing, American engineer
1910 Bonnie Parker, American outlaw
1920 Walter Matthau, American actor
1924 James Earl Carter, Jr, 39th President of the USA, and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize
1928 George Peppard, American Actor
1930 Sir Richard Harris, Irish actor
1935 Dame Julie Andrews, British actor
1950 Randy Quaid, American Actor
1951 Baroness Susan Greenfield, neuroscientist and director of the Royal Institution
1959 Youssou N’Dour, Senegalese singer
1964 Harry Hill, British comedian
1968 Phil Glanville, former rugby player
1985 Dizzee Rascal, British musician
Cardinal Cathal Daly, former primate of All Ireland

Died
959 Kind Edwy of England
1189 Gerard de Ridefort, grandmaster of the Templars
1404 Pope Boneiface IX
1992 Petra Kelly, German politician
2000 Reggie Kray, British gangster
2004 Richard Avedon, American photographer

Postscript 1:
I am a vegetarian and, by a weird co-incidence, today is World Vegetarian Day. Well, in America anyway.

Postscript 2:
China celebrates the National Day of the People’s Republic of China, while Roman Catholics celebrate the feast day of Saint Thérèse de Lisieux. Although she was writing about holiness and her love of God, I think there’s something useful in her writings:

“Love proves itself by deeds, so how am I to show my love? Great deeds are forbidden me. The only way I can prove my love is by scattering flowers and these flowers are every little sacrifice, every glance and word, and the doing of the least actions for love.”

Applied to everyday life, who could argue with that? Well, ask me in two hours because the new season of Cracker starts on ITV in a few minutes!!

Bon voyage to the next adventure…

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