A DOUBLE CELEBRATION
Drive-by parade salutes family with shared birthday, Irish
Joann Zaleski drove to her mother’s Greenwich home Sunday morning to finally break the news: For months, she had been planning a surprise parade to celebrate her mom’s 95th birthday.
“She doesn’t hear well over the phone, and we wanted to get her up and ready and bedazzled in her green St. Patrick’s Day attire” for the event, said Zaleski, who lives in Stamford.
The parade stepped off a few days early for Pat Chrusz, whose birthday is Wednesday, which is also St. Patrick’s Day.
Chrusz, who has been strict about following social distancing protocols since the COVID-19 pandemic hit, was excited, especially since she wasn’t expecting a
celebration this year.
By 11:30 a.m. Sunday, she was sitting outside her Hickory Drive home, greeting a long line of cars filled with loved ones as they drove by. Friends and family dropped off candy, balloons and flowers as they blew kisses and wished her a happy birthday. Some cars were decorated, and friends popped their heads out of the sunroofs to wave.
“We had friends, we had family, we had young and old,” Zaleski said. “I just wanted everybody to just share in the happiness of how well she’s doing at 95.”
Chrusz celebrated alongside her son-in-law John, Joann Zaleski’s husband, who has the same birthday on St. Patrick’s Day, when he’ll be turning 65.
It was soon after Joann met John decades ago that she learned he shared a birthday with her mother. The family soon decided it was an “omen.” In the 40 years since, Joann Zaleski said her mother and husband have celebrated together, often eating or drinking something green, including corned beef and cabbage, pistachio cake or green beer, to also mark St. Patrick’s Day.
“There hasn’t been a day that the two of them haven’t gotten along. They’re two peas in a pod. They’re very happy and supportive of each other,” Zaleski said. Her mother even keeps a special list on the side of her refrigerator for him.
“Whenever my husband goes down there, he checks the side of the refrigerator for his chores that my mother has for him,” Zaleski said. The family calls it “John’s to-do list.”
For Sunday’s drive-by parade, the attendees first gathered in a nearby parking lot, where Zaleski’s brother John and cousin Margie handed out masks and lined up the cars in single file. Five fire trucks from the nearby Glenville Volunteer Fire Company were spread throughout the line of the parade. About 80 people in 40 cars took part.
On Monday, Chrusz, who enjoys gardening, was busy arranging all the flowers
brought by loved ones for her birthday.
Zaleski said she plans to organize a similar event for her mother’s 100th birthday.
“My mother is a truly amazing person, with a sense of humor, and everybody loves her, and we’d like to thank everybody
who came out,” she said of Chrusz, who was one of nine children but has only one sister still alive.
“We were totally overwhelmed by the love and support, and surprised that so many people took time out of their lives to come and acknowledge this,” Zaleski said.
Pat Chrusz and John Zaleski aren’t the only two in the family who share a birthday.
Zaleski’s son has a birthday on March 11, which he also shares with his mother-in-law.