A Golden Birthday
Occasions Missed and Those to Come
Today, May 24, 2023, my niece turns 24. That makes it her “golden” birthday.
I wonder if she knows it’s her golden birthday? A golden birthday is when a person’s age corresponds to the date they were born. My own would have been February 12, 1972, the year I turned 12.
I never even heard of golden birthdays until I started teaching fifth grade in Virginia a few years back. Are golden birthdays a Southern thing?
The term apparently originated in the 1950s, and technically would have been in vogue when I was coming up, but I don’t know if we celebrated them in the Northeast.
Golden birthdays are also called champagne birthdays, and Google says there is something called a diamond birthday, which is when the last two digits of your birth year match your age. I was born in 1960, and marked my 60th birthday three years ago. I didn’t realize at the time that it was my platinum.
My father, who was born July 9, 1916, would have had his golden when he turned nine in 1925. His platinum, would have occurred when he was 16, in 1932, the year before his mother died.
Oh, to teleport back to those early Twentieth Century birthdays.
Can’t do that, but I can anticipate the golden and diamond birthdays of the next generation. My niece with today’s golden birthday will celebrate her diamond birthday when she turns 100 in the year 2099. I will miss that party, but I have a shot at my oldest nephew’s diamond birthday. Born in 1980, he will turn 80, in 2060, the year of my centennial birthday.
Our youngest family member, born March 1, 2022, just had her golden birthday. It’s unlikely any of us were aware of it being her golden one, but her diamond birthday, celebrated when she turns 22, is in 2044.
We’ll get that one the calendar.
Ah! I, too, had my golden birthday in 1972 — May 12, to be precise — and also age 12 like you were the same year. I never knew then what a monumental year it was!
I grew up in NYC in the 50s and never heard of Golden Birthdays. I googled it and it says that Joan Bramsch, an author, came up with the Golden Birthdays for her children. This is a very nice story.