MARK MY WORD; WRITER TRIES TO 'CAST AWAY' BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION

Birthdays are big news when you're young, but they lose their luster as you get older.

My children, for example, get easily excited about birthdays. Becca already is planning for her ninth birthday celebration. At this point, it's a choice between a tea party and a roller skating party.

So far, the idea of a tea party is winning out, but I wouldn't be surprised if it becomes a tea party on roller skates. Whatever happens, I'm sure it won't be a sit-down-and-be-still tea party. Besides, I'm sure she and her pals won't really want to drink tea.

Bailey, as alert readers know, just turned 5 a few weeks ago, leading to a massive celebration at the local bowling alley.

I turned a year older last week. I tried to ignore it, but my friends and my wife, Joni, wouldn't let me.

We celebrated at a local restaurant that didn't embarrass me by trotting out singing waiters and waitresses. I did get a free chocolate-rich dessert, which helped ease the pain of turning a year older.

Becca and Bailey told all their classmates just exactly how old their dad was. I know that's the case because one of Becca's after-school-care teachers said she didn't know I was that old.

Such is life when you get to middle age. "I'm going to have to have a mid-life crisis soon or I'll be too old for such a thing," I informed Joni the other day.

After our dinner date, Joni took me to a movie to further celebrate my birthday. We saw "Cast Away," a movie about a FedEx man who washes ashore on a deserted island with only a volleyball and some soggy packages for friends.

But then it could have been worse. Tom Hanks could have had a birthday on Friday just like me. That would have been enough to send even the volleyball over the edge.

When you're 8 years old, this kind of stuff doesn't happen. You don't wash up on a lonely beach, you plan birthday parties and spend countless hours on your karaoke machine.

Birthdays never come soon enough when you're young. When you get to be my age, you wish you could cheat Father Time or at least slow him down.

Still, I suppose January suits me fine for a birthday, particularly in my aging frame of mind.

No one expects much out of January, coming on the heels of all those New Year's celebrations and right after all those eat-drink-and-be-merry Christmas festivities. People have had their fill of parties. They don't expect massive celebrations in January.

It's a month named for a Roman god, Janus. January and February were added to the 10-month Roman calendar in about 700 B.C. If they hadn't been, I would have been born in March, and the college basketball season would have been a real mess.

Romans eventually made January the first month of the year. In 46 B.C., Julius Caesar added a day to January to squeeze in the Super Bowl.

The Anglo-Saxons called the first month Wolfmonth, because wolves came into the villages in winter in search of food. Fortunately, I haven't seen any wolves at my doorstep.

The World Book Encyclopedia has plenty to say about January. "Nature is quiet. Birds travel less and such animals as bears and woodchucks sleep both day and night."

Despite my advancing years, I thankfully haven't been mistaken for a bear or woodchuck. But that's because my friends and family won't let me hibernate, not when there's a birthday to celebrate.