94 Candles and Aiden

And maybe if she had had fewer kids she wouldn't have snapped like she did, but she had seven children and lo-and-behold, one day she showed up at my front door babbling something about the Soviet Union and Narwhales, convinced that she was Mrs. Gandhi.1

Gene and I took her into our care for a while, 20 minutes actually. I sat and discussed Moby Dick and Indian politics with her until my Uncle Blair and all the kids arrived to drive her home. Except Brad. Brad didn't come to anything. That should be 'doesn't' actually. Last I'd heard of him he was attending a college in Cairo, Egypt, working as a bell boy for some fancy resort for rich white kids who's parents sent them away to the Middle East for vacation, hoping they'd meet a girl and stay there. Brad's fifty now I think, yes that'd be right, twenty years younger than me. I have a nagging feeling that he still works there.2

94 Candles and Aiden3

By the time most people are 13, they have grown out of having their age in candles on their birthday cake.4

My uncle Richard was turning 94. And forget the candles, that cake alone would have to have a surface area of at least 94 inches. But we felt it was our morale obligation, after all, he'd been working out at the gym for the past 11 months, lifting one-pounders to build the lung capacity to blow them all out in one breath. So, in a burst of kindness and morality, more an explosion really, I sent my 15-year-old son off to buy the candles. All 94 of them. I should have known. Prepped myself. Became a volunteer firefighter. Or at least doused my husband's exotic string collection with lighter fluid. Instead I put up paper streamers, helium balloons, and all sorts decorations that lure disaster and pyromaniacs. Not to say that Aiden was a pyromaniac, but I'm not going to let him any slack. If you're curious, look up the meaning of Aiden and you'll see why. The name fits him like a glove. A tight one.5

The cake was fairly simple. And it only took two days to bake all nine layers. It was a blast. You can get used to a 110-degree kitchen in July. Really. It was when the time came to light the candles that I began to worry. Not about the candles themselves, but about the methods one would use to light 94 candles on nine different layers of cake. As far as I could figure, it would take an act of heroics to keep them all lit and everything else not. The family was gathered in the dinning room with the lights off, awaiting the flaming cake anxiously.6

To shorten things up, Maria and I both grabbed a lighter and whizzed around the cake, lighting opposite sides, spiraling upwards and attempting not to light our sleeves on fire, or anything else flammable; Our arms, hair, the dog, etc. By the time we got to the top, the cake was a four-foot tall mass of flaming wax. Perfect. It took three of us to carry it into the dining room, leaning away from the leaping flames. That thing gave off more heat than the time Richard had blown up a hornet nest with a half stick of dynamite. Good times. We set it on the coffee table, and everyone sang "Happy birthday" to Richard and the kids all did the "Are you one? Are you two?" verse which took a little over ten minutes, all the time Uncle Richard croaking, "What? What? Are you talking to me?" Then he took a breath and blew. Theoretically, with a breath of that size and strength, even issued from a 94-year-old, even any uncooperative candles would have been blown out or away. These ones didn't. They flickered out for a minute, and then flared right up again, higher than before. Richard was not daunted by this little let down. He took another breath and blew, harder than before. The candles flickered, and the one on the top layer jumped a little too high. The balloon that had been hovering above the cake burst, and the dog under the coffee table jumped up in surprise, flipping over the table, and sending the flaming cake into the air. Hot wax splattered across the room, landing on everyone's skin and clothes. There were screams and cousin Alex jumped and shook herself, knocking over the jug of punch and bottle of wine. They fell to the floor and burst, spraying red liquid everywhere. Mom, who was running to get water to put out the fires that were all over the living room, slipped on the spilled beverages, and the pitcher she was carrying went flying, crashing into Grandma's antique chandelier, which swung wildly, before the rope snapped and it went crashing to the ground, bits glass flying everywhere. The glass hit the lamp, which burst into flames, startling Marissa's parakeet, which screeched wildly and jumped around, shaking it's cage which came unhooked from it's hinges and smashed to the ground, releasing the parakeet. It flew across the room screaming, and landed on Abigail's head, who screamed and flailed around, kicking the cat, who snarled and jumped onto the counter, knocking over the prized flower vase.7

It was about this time that I looked up and realized the Uncle Richard was gasping and clutching his chest. The ambulance arrived in time, along with the fire department and the police, who had already received several disturbance reports from the neighbors. Uncle Richard was fine, and he refused to spend the week in the hospital, immortal as he was. As I cleaned up the mess, a breeze came in through the open window, and an empty package scuttled across the floor. I picked it up and looked at the label. It read, "Trick Candles!"8

The next year Uncle Richard asked for 95 candles.9