That's part of the Pogo newspaper strip that ran on February 29, 1952. The morning that appeared all across the nation, Bernard and Dorothy Evanier were expecting to become parents any minute. Dorothy was pregnant and that was the day I was due. But somehow, no one had bothered to tell me.
If I'd been born that day as per the schedule, I would today be celebrating my seventeenth birthday. I did not emerge into the world on 2/29/52 and I also did not make my much-anticipated debut on 3/1/52. The day after that, some impatient doctor — probably sick of waiting and eager to get out on the golf course — made the decision to go in and get me. I was removed from my mom's innards, that impatient doctor guy slapped me and, as I tell everyone to this day, I dropped whatever comic book I was reading at the time.
If they'd waited one day longer to send in the S.W.A.T. team, I could have been born on my parents' first anniversary. When I was a tot and people asked me — as people often ask small children — "When's your birthday?", I would answer, "I was born on March second. My parents were married on March third."
That always got a laugh. I didn't know why but it got a laugh so I kept saying it despite my mother's embarrassed plea to not do that or to at least include the years.
I was my parents' first and only child. An interesting thing that happened on the day I was finally born was that the doctors who delivered me told my mother not to do that again. That is not a joke. When they opened her up to spring me, they noticed loads of scar tissue and apparently what had delayed my roll-out was that I was, as I remain to this day, in an unnatural position.
Once outside her, I was reportedly lying on her stomach when they told her not to risk having any more children. Being about fifteen minutes old at the time, I somehow have no memory of this. I do remember being around twelve years of age when my folks decided I was old enough to hear and understand the story of why I had no brothers or sisters — a lack that has never bothered me for one second. I had my own room. I got 100% of my parents' attention. No one touched my comic book collection but me.
And I was spared the problem I witnessed in my pre-teen years at the home of every single friend of mine who did not have the great fortune to be an only child: Brothers and sisters fighting and screaming at each other all the time. Most often, the screaming was of the phrase, "Keep your hands off my stuff!"
You may think I'm exaggerating but I am not. I don't think I knew a single kid my age who did not let me in on their occasional private fantasies of seeing a little sister or older brother (or vice-versa) die an agonizing death. Sometimes, they told me how much they envied me my lack of siblings.
The only brothers or sisters I met who were happy to have one another around were identical twins. They shared the special bond that when they conspired, they could confuse the hell out of everyone else. A couple times when I was asked if I didn't wish I had a brother, I think I actually answered, "Only if he looks exactly like me." This was obviously after 1961 when I saw Hayley Mills and Hayley Mills in The Parent Trap.
Upon reflection, I'm glad I didn't have another me around. I don't think I could have handled even a duplicate of myself pawing through my comic books and I certainly wouldn't have wanted to share a room with a brother, no matter how handsome he was. No one else was needed in our family. I had a great relationship with my parents until the day each of them passed away.
And I escaped having February 29 as my birthday. I know that may sound kind of special and, yes, I know that in the Superman mythos, that's the date they say the Man of Steel was born. Someone once told me maybe being born on 2/29 would be good luck like it was for Superman. I responded, "What good luck? A couple days after you're born, your entire planet explodes!"
If I had been born on Leap Year Day, I think I would have taken the position that you can't sing "Happy Birthday" to me unless the calendar says it's February 29. I've never really liked that custom and it would be nice to have it happen one-fourth as often. Unfortunately then, people would have taken the position that they only had to give me gifts when the calendar said it was February 29…