By Oliver B. Pollak
ENCINITAS, California — Jerry Joe Seller was born in St. Louis in 1928. Life expectancy in 1930 was 58 for men and 62 for women. We celebrated his 90th birthday on August 19 at Vigilucci’s Trattoria Italiana on Pacific Coast Highway in Encinitas.
Birthdays come and go. They last a day. The big ONE you never remember. Then ice cream, cookies, punch, parties in the park, and sleepovers. Double digits, then Jewishly significant 13. Between 16 and 21 are Sweet Sixteen, driver’s license, emancipation, minor to adult, and voting age. Then a series of zeros and fives – 30, 50, 75, and so on. The reciprocal of your father or mother, or one of your children hangs in for a few months as a mathematical curiosity. The boxes of old cards in the garage and attic reveal sentimental and historical cards.
Howard P. Chudacoff of Brown University published How Old Are You? Age Consciousness in American Culture in 1989. England introduced penny postage in 1840 and later in the decade Christmas cards. By the 1870s Americans were printing birthday cards.
The older and more mature you get, nostalgia, wry humor, allusions to decrepitude mix in the ultimately uplifting greeting, Many Happy Returns of the Day. At the upper end we have been to three 100ths, and a 95th. My Navy friend’s father is preparing for his 102nd birthday. Despite declining eyesight, hearing, mobility and other frailties, nonagenarians still have an appetite for cake and recognition.
Jerry and his late wife Doris were friends of my wife’s parents Reva and Joe. They met in the mid-1950s, both being newcomers to Southern California. Karen babysat for their children, Debbie and David. Thirty guests came from Northern California, St. Louis and Chicago to San Diego to celebrate. Debbie and David hosted the event that included six grandchildren. There were candles on the cake, though not 90. We toasted with sparkling cider in crystal flutes to avoid any alcohol-medication issues. The birthday boy was widowed in 2011 and married again in 2017 to Ruth, another Seacrest resident. Jerry, a Korean War vet, talked about the miracles in his life. Friends and family members gave loving tributes. One of the two rabbis in attendance gave a talk. He noted that he regarded Jerry very highly even though they did not always agree on politics.
Family and friends from St. Louis made a loop of 170 photos set to music. Party favors included a bulging bag of candy which we devoured driving home. Roundtrip about 1,000 miles, and a pitted windshield courtesy of Highway 5.
Your author, the second oldest person at the party, fortified by La Crema Chardonnay and Rodney Strong Pinot Noir cast aside his prepared remarks and offered a few words about the algorithm of friendship and finding a mate based on a little 61-page book, To Be a Friend, Sayings and Verses celebrating the beauty of friendship (Hallmark editions, 1967). It contained 220 statements on the subject including ten from Psalms, Proverbs, Solomon, Old Testament, Ecclesiastes, Benjamin Disraeli and Friedrich Nietzsche.
“Poopsy whoopsy” signed the 1971 inscription on the front flyleaf.
Jerry, the birthday boy, was the only person still living who had signed the flyleaf along with Karen’s parents, and Doris. Bingo, hiding in plain sight was the answer. Karen told my sister Judy that ‘poopsy whoopsy’ was in my mother’s handwriting, and Judy looked at the date at the top of the page, 26 October, and exclaimed that it was my father’s birthday. None of us had heard this term of affection before. For how long will we still be learning new details about our parents?
It would be nice to see the remarks and endearments in his birthday cards. We wrote,
“You are way above the legal speed limit, and you don’t drive
“They should print a $90 bill for the occasion
“90 is a good grade and premium gasoline.
“90 means you are in the 99% percentile of the American population.”
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Pollak, a professor emeritus of history at the University of Nebraska Omaha, and a lawyer, is a correspondent now based in Richmond, California. He may be contacted via oliver.pollak@sdjewishworld.com