Getting this in under the wire tonight. Thank you so much to everyone sending birthday wishes! I promise this year’s birthday ghost story will not make you cry like last year’s. Unless, of course, you cry at German chanting…
When anyone has a 21st birthday coming up I offer very specific advice. Not what to drink and what not to drink. Not how much water to consume, not even whether to get drunk or not. My advice is this: “Choose your company wisely.”
I didn’t, and it’s haunted me for decades now.
My 21st birthday was at college and Jim and Mike took me out to get hammered at the local dive bar. Jim and I had been roommates for the last two years and we’re tight. Mike, on the other hand… He recently moved into the house we rented on the west side at the recommendation of the guy who was moving out. He seemed nice enough, but in some ways, he was just… off. He didn’t like to socialize with us or, really, with anyone. That’s fine on the face of it – don’t get me wrong, we probably should have socialized less and did more homework (20/20 hindsight and all that), but you could hear chanting from behind his locked door. “Oh, it’s this Gregorian chant CD – I like to study to it.” But it wasn’t the CD. The chanting voice was Mike’s. There were a lot of other things you could chalk up on their own to just being young and eccentric – always wore black, always burned copious incense, satanic symbol tattoos (“You guys don’t know what you’re talking about – those are ancient Mesopotamian symbols!”) … All of it taken together, though…
Anyway, we were well in the process of getting hammered when Mike asked, “How many times have you had the happy birthday song sang to you today?”
I thought through my rapidly growing haze of alcohol and replied, “Umm, none. I didn’t really tell anyone it was my birthday. Y’all are really the only ones who know.” I spread my arms wide to encompass all the patrons at the bar “And everyone here, am I right? Happy Birthday to me!”
I looked back at Mike and his face had lost all color and his mouth hung agape. “Candles,” he sputtered insistently. “How many candles have you blown out?”
“None, Mike. None. I just told you, you guys are, like, the only ones who know.”
“And we love you for it, Andy,” Jim said with exaggerated affection, grabbing my head and kissing my forehead. I fell off my barstool laughing, while Jim broke into a wheezing guffaw.
Mike stared at us with panic in his eyes. “Presents?” he demanded.
“We’re all present!” I said from the floor, again, taking in everyone at the bar. “Thank you all for being present!”
“Did you get any?”
“No,” I waved him off. “This is present enough!” I climbed back up onto my barstool and Jim clapped me on the back so hard I nearly fell off again.
Then Mike began to sing, but it wasn’t melodic. It was more a tuneless chant…. Of the “Happy Birthday” song. “Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday, dear Andy. Happy Birthday to you.” Then he did it again, louder. “Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday, dear Andy! Happy Birthday to you!” People were staring, but he started a third round of the chant, even louder, “HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!”
I slapped him. He was seriously killing my buzz. People legitimately cheered. Mike seemed to come to his senses a little.
“Bro,” Jim started, “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“I’m sorry,” he said holding his half-drank mug of beer to his reddened cheek. “It’s just… no one has appeased your birthday ghost. I… I just can’t leave you open to that.”
Jim and I exchanged incredulous looks. “Mike?” he looked up at me, “What the fuck is a birthday ghost?”
He looked between us rapidly. “You don’t know?”
I gave him a sidelong gaze.
“You seriously don’t know?” Andy asked again.
“Bro, why don’t you tell us,” Jim suggested.
“The Germans call it ‘Geburtstagsgeist’…”
“Because of course the Germans…” Jim rolled his eyes.
“The Geburtstagsgeist, or birthday ghost,” Mike continued unabated, “comes into this realm the same moment you are born. It’s… it’s the Yang to your Yin… there’s birth and there’s….”
“Death,” I said, curious.
“Right. Balance. It’s been this way for every birth since… well, since we were humans. Birthday celebrations are about appeasing the birthday ghost.”
Jim held out a hand. “Uh, you lost me somewhere between ‘balance’ and ‘appeasement’.”
“It’s the German thing, right?” I stage whispered to Jim.
Oblivious to my comment, Mike picked up, “Take the birthday song. It is derived from an ancient chant designed to keep evil spirits at bay.”
“Yeah, I’m gonna call bullshit on that, Mikey,” Jim said. “I happen to know the birthday song originated with Mildred and Patty Smith Hall’s ‘Good Morning To You’ in 1893 and was first codified as ‘Happy Birthday to You’ in a 1923 songbook.”
“How the fuck do you know that?” I asked.
Jim looked taken aback that I would question him. “Do you not know by now that I am a deep and vast compendium of useless information? And there’s a fucking lawsuit over the copyright. Pick up a fucking newspaper, you illiterate,” he swatted my shoulder.
“Ah,” Mike waggled his finger as if we’d just given him a jolt of adrenaline. “See, that’s the tune! Not the words! ‘Zum Geburtstag viel Glück! Zum Geburtstag viel Glück! Zum Geburtstag liebe Andy! Zum Geburtstag viel Glück!’” And he looked at us like that solved the argument.
“First ‘Sieg heil’ and I’m bolting for the door,” Jim said to me seriously.
“Don’t you get it?” Andy asked. “That’s the chant in German! It keeps your birthday ghost at bay. If you or anyone around you doesn’t sing the birthday song – in German, or English, or whatever – then you are open to your birthday ghost devouring your soul!”
“I’m going to have a hangover that will make me wish my soul were devoured,” I said, and Jim and I clinked beers.
“Okay, fine,” Mike conceded, “But what about cake and candles? You can’t deny that!”
“Dude, I really want cake now,” Jim said.
“Mike? What’s with cake and candles that we can’t deny?”
“I won’t deny cake with my belly!” Jim bellowed lifting his shirt.
“Guys come on! Burnt offering? Like, you’re setting something on fire as an offering to the spirit world. How much more obvious does this have to get? Imagine it were incense instead of candles…”
“That’d make the cake taste like shit, I imagine…”
“But think about it. It’s the same thing but more obviously spiritual. Originally, the ancient Germanic tribes did burn incense on top of unleavened bread as a burnt offering to the birthday ghost.”
“Well, that explains Kraftwerk,” Jim said.
“Jim,” I said earnestly, “I am in no way drunk enough for this shit…”
“And presents?” Mike continued, “Literal offerings to the birthday ghost.”
“Mike, next thing you’re going to tell me, the old birthday spankings thing is whacking the ghost out of you.”
“Ah! You’re getting it now!” he nodded excitedly.
“For your edification,” Jim said behind my ear, “I’m not whacking anything out of you.”
“Duly noted,” I nodded. “And I thank you for that.” We bumped fists. I downed the last of my beer and caught the bartender’s attention for another as Mike looked happier than I had ever seen him. “Mike,” I started. “Let’s say all of this is legit. Let’s say there are birthday ghosts assigned to every person and that we’ve developed these rituals to keep them from ‘devouring our souls,’ I think you said.”
“I did,” he nodded seriously.
“Okay… what exactly does that…. Look like? Because… I’m not buying it. What does it look like?”
“What does it look like?” Mike asked incredulously. “What does it look like?” He climbed off his stool and took a step backwards. “Look like?!” he yelled. “I’ll show you!” and a silver light began emanating from his eyes and his mouth dropped open and a high-pitched shriek came from his throat as silver light began pouring from his mouth, then ears, then nostrils, and the shriek became louder and drowned out all other sound in the bar. The light grew in intensity and Mike – or what used to be Mike – arched its back in an inhumanly bow as the shriek erupted into a roar that blotted out rational thought and the light encompassed everything and then with a clap that shook the foundation of the bar, the light and howl winked into nothing and silence. Mike was gone, but the scent of sulfur and brimstone hung heavy in the bar and the carpet looked to be singed. Everyone stared at the spot occupied moments ago by a living, breathing, albeit ranting, Mike.
“We have first and last and his deposit, right?” I asked Jim as I picked up the fresh beer off the bar.
“Oh yeah, yeah…” Jim assured.
But let me tell you, from that day forward I never hesitate to sing happy birthday to anyone. I weekly bake cupcakes and carry them with candles in my lunch just in case I encounter someone’s birthday. I have no less than three wrapped gifts in my trunk at all times. But I don’t spank anyone on their birthday, because that shit’s bananas.
