When Seven Equals Seventeen
by: Jon Crane

Saturday Ramblins, Vol. 1, No. 23 (October 24, 1998)

This month marks the opening of the birthday season for me. For some reason, my daughters all decided to be born between the middle of October and the first week of December, leaving my credit cards smoking just in time to start Christmas shopping.

There were many memorable birthdays as they were growing up, but the one that stands out in my mind was my youngest's 11th. She'd asked me if she could have a sleep-over with her friends. I asked, "How many?" She mumbled something about 10 or 12.

"Too many. Think six, including you."

"Including me? Why not six plus me? Please?" I caved. "Okay, six plus you. That's seven last time I went to school." She agreed and I planned pizzas, ice cream, cake, soda and snacks for seven girls, 11 and 12-years-old.

My other daughters suddenly had plans for that Friday night, taking them out of the house for the evening. Well, I was a big boy. What were seven 11-year-olds to me? Read on.

All the children had been instructed to bring their own pillows and blankets and they'd sleep on the floor in the living room. By five p.m., the first ones began to arrive. They entered by the door in the kitchen passing the table where I was sitting. I counted ... 1, 2, 3, 4 ... A few minutes later the door opened again and some more came in ... 5, 6 7, 8, 9 ...

During the next ten minutes, I kept counting as this parade of pre-adolescent females passed by seemingly without end. 10, 11, 12 ... 16, 17. I waited. I waited another full 10 minutes but no one else showed.

I slipped into the living room where Amy was surrounded with this throng of little beauties. "Amy?" I asked, smiling politely at everyone in the room. "May I please see you for a minute in the kitchen, sweetheart?" I smiled all around the room again as I made my exit.

"Let me explain," were Amy's first words as she entered the kitchen.

"You'd better," I said, not even blinking.

"See, I asked Stacy, Anna, Nicole, and Amanda, but they told me they couldn't come. So then I asked Angela, Liza, Frannie and Lucy who said they could, then Stacy, Anna, Nicole and Amanda told me they could so I couldn't 'un-ask' the other ones, could I?"

"That's ten including Mellie and Suzanne. Where did the other seven come from," I demanded.

"Well, after Amanda said she could come, then she said she couldn't so I asked Lorrie in her place, then Amanda decided she could and by then it was too late to tell Lorrie she couldn't come, and, then when Nicole's mother got mad at her--"

"Wait!" I cried. "All that doesn't matter now. How am I supposed to feed all those girls with food for only seven? She gave me the signature reply of the pre-teen: a shrug of the shoulders.

By that time, Melissa, my foster daughter who'd been hiding up stairs, appeared. The two of us set to work in the kitchen heating the frozen pizzas and slicing them into small squares to make it appear like there was more. We cut the cake in paper-thin servings and doled out the ice cream in little Dixie cups. Everyone got a sip of soda. But no one complained.

Later, I did my best to scare as many of them home to their mamas as I could by telling the scariest ghost stories I knew. While the house was periodically shattered with piercing screams at punch lines, none of them left. By bedtime (a misnomer with 17 11-year-olds sleeping over), the girls were spread out like a thick carpet on the living and dining room floors. I had to gingerly pick my way through them on my way upstairs.

Breakfast the next morning was another re-enactment of the miracle of the fishes and loaves, only this time I did it by making pancakes so thin that light passed through them.

In the end it was an enjoyable--and memorable--occasion. It never happened again, though. Head counts were taken and the doors were locked after the allowable limit of guests showed up. It was moments like this, however, that made raising these little angels one hell of a heaven.

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