We have celebrated two birthdays while I have been here in India, one today and one at the end of last week. For each, we bought a cake. Last week we celebrated the birthday of a beautiful widowed friend. We brought her a cake and sang “Happy Birthday” to her and all the while she said, “Why waste your money on me?” We explained to her (several times) that we weren’t wasting money. Because she is special according to God she is not a waste of money, time, or life. She is a precious individual and worth celebrating. She denied it. She denied her worthiness multiples times throughout her birthday celebration. As we walked out of her home, at the close of the celebration, she denied her worth a final time. She denied that she was beautiful, which we reassured her with our love that her beauty ran deep, inside and out.
The cake we brought her was her first birthday cake ever. She was 38 years old.
Blessings,
MW - Summer 2012 Volunteer
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