My Aunt Jessie, who lives just past the clothesline from my mother, was there and brought some of her wonderful creamed corn. I ate myself under the table. 

Anyway, since it was a birthday we were celebrating, the question of age came up. My Aunt Jessie said proudly she was 75 and she hoped and prayed to live to be 100, which she'll probably make. She stays too busy not to. 

"Didn't you just have a birthday?" somebody asked me. 

I admitted I did. 

"How old were you?" asked my Aunt Jessie. 

"Thirty-nine," I said. 

I hadn't really thought a lot about my birthday until the subject was brought up at home. I hadn't thought much about reaching 39, either. 
 

39 isn't really old . . .
 

Thirty-nine. Certainly, it doesn't seem as old to me as it once did, but 39 is sort of the year you have to admit you're losing the battle against time. 

You fight time when you're younger. It passes much too slowly, but all of a sudden, the years have sneaked away and there you stand on the threshold of 40, which is the year, if you're a single man, it's time you quit messing around with women who don't know how World War II came out. 

"It doesn't seem like it's been 39 years since you were born," said my Aunt Jessie, who is very outspoken. 

"I remember going to see you in the hospital," she went on. "I believe you were the ugliest baby I've ever seen." 

My mother was eating birthday cake and not paying attention, so there was nobody in the room to defend me. 

"You were just a tiny thing and you had the reddest face," my aunt continued. "I thought at first there was something wrong with you." 

"There was," said one of my cousins. I chose to ignore that remark. 

My Aunt Jessie was just warming up, concerning the secrets of my infancy. 
 

Galded? What's that?
 

"I baby-sat you all the time," she said, "and you were the worst one to get galded I've ever seen." 

I didn't know what "galded" meant, so I asked my cousin. 

"Getting a raw butt," she explained. 

My aunt went on. 

"I was trying to change you one day and I had a jar of Vaseline sitting on the table. I don't think you were a year old yet, but you picked up the jar of Vaseline and threw it across the room. 

"It shattered into a thousand pieces and I popped you a good one right on your behind. I left my handprint on you, and I was scared to death your mama or daddy would see it, but they didn't. But I don't think you ever threw a jar of Vaseline again, either." 

I haven't. As a matter of fact, every time I see a jar of Vaseline I get a severe pain in my . . . well, where my aunt popped me one. 

Before the day was over, I decided not to be concerned with the fact I'm 39 an d soon will be 40. Anybody born as ugly as I was and who was subjected to such cruelty as an infant is darn lucky to have made it this far. 

And before I go, girls, one last thing. We won. Big.