Little Stories: Rain on My Birthday
How a lie my father told me became a lifelong ritual.
Little Stories, focusing on memories from my youth, is a recurring feature of Inconspicuous Consumption. You can see more Little Stories here.
My birthday gift to you: This installment of Little Stories is not paywalled and is available to all. Enjoy! — Paul
Good morning! Today is my birthday — I’m turning 61 (a prime number!). I have lots of fun activities planned, at least one of which I’ll be writing about in the near future.
All of my plans for today are indoors. But that wasn’t the case 52 years ago today, when I turned nine years old. We had some sort of outdoor birthday activity planned (I no longer recall what it was), but we had to scrap that plan because it rained. I was inconsolable, but my father, thinking quickly, put his arm around me and told me that the rain was actually a good thing.
“Don’t you know?” he said. “Rain on your birthday is a sign of good luck in the year to come.” It was a very sweet lie that he made up on the spot, and I totally bought it. He was good at stuff like that.
As it turned out, it rained again on my birthday the following year — and the year after that, and the year after that. Each time it happened, I thought, Oooh, that means good luck, so it became something I looked forward to and enjoyed.
And it’s a good thing I did, because it ended up raining on my birthday for 35 years in a row. Or, rather, it precipitated on my birthday — a few times it snowed, and one time it hailed (both of which I figured counted for extra-good luck). Whether I was in college, traveling, or wherever, I could always count on the clouds delivering some sort of emission on March 21st.
The streak was finally broken in 2008, when I turned 44 on a clear, rain-free day here in NYC. I was depressed — it felt like an important cog in the universe had come out of alignment. But the rain resumed the following year (just barely) and has remained more the rule than the exception since then.
As for this year, it will indeed rain on my birthday. In fact, it will already have done so by the time you read this. Here’s what the forecast looked like as of last night:
Not as rainy as my birthday usually turns out to be, but it still counts. I’ll take it!
Even better, my birthday got off to an early start yesterday, because the inconspicu-verse gave me a very special present. I’ll have more to say about that next week — you’re gonna like it, I promise. Have a great weekend, and I’ll see you then.
Paul Lukas has been obsessing over the inconspicuous for most of his life, and has been writing about those obsessions for more than 30 years. You can contact him here.
Happy birthday, Paul! Thank you for all you do!
Happy Birthday 🎂