I will be celebrating my birthday in a few days as I write this. My birthday is September, 25th. Why should you care? You shouldn’t, unless it’s your birthday also.
I share my birthday with my friend Tony. Okay, I’m older, but we still share the day. He, like me, drives a truck for a living. So, whenever we meet, we greet each other with “happy birthday!” This elicits the expected response: “What, is today your birthday?”
Once a year, it is.
Now, this piqued my curiosity. Who else was born on that day?
Well, for starters, actor Will Smith. News reporter Barbara Walters. Actors Mark Hamill and Christopher Reeve were born that day. Hey, Luke Skywalker and Superman? Who knew?
American author William Faulkner shares a birthday with me. So does artist Mark Rothko. Baseball Hall Of Famer Phil Rizzuto was born on the same day as me. Holy Cow!
Actor Michael Douglas and his wife Catherine Zeta Jones were born on the same day. As me.
Russian composer Dimitri Shostokovich was born on this day.
So was Shel Silverstein.
If you look up “Renaissance Man” in the dictionary, you may just find a picture of Shel Silverstein. He was a poet and writer, who’s work often appeared in Playboy, Esquire, and The New Yorker. Silverstein was a cartoonist. One of my favorites shows two emaciated prisoners shackled in an 8×10 cell, 40′ tall with a slit of a window at the top. One prisoner, looking at the window, leans over to the other and says, “Now, here’s my plan…”
Silverstein was no stranger to New York’s Bohemian community. He hung out with folksingers and Beatnicks in Greenwich Village, and made many friends. As such, he was also a songwriter. His songs were recorded by many famous people. Dave van Ronk recorded Welcome To Our House. Johnny Cash recorded A Boy Named Sue and 25 Minutes To Go. Silverstein wrote a ditty called Cover Of The Rolling Stone which became a hit for Dr. Hook And The Medicine Show. But Silverstein’s best-known song is probably The Unicorn, which was a hit for The Irish Rovers. So, next St. Patrick’s day, when someone sings The Unicorn, and tries to tell you that it’s an old Irish Folk Song, please set them straight. It was written in the ’60s by a Jewish guy from New York City.
Happy birthday! Representin’ 9-2-5. HARD!
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