We live next door to a young Jewish family with two girls and a boy under 10-years-old. The wife has relatives in Israel that she visits every year. I often hear her speaking Hebrew over the phone or with guests. They are devout in that they celebrate all the holy days, and Friday nights, before Shabbat, are always lively.
Over the weekend one of the girls had a birthday which they are still celebrating. Each day it seems someone new shows up and they have to have another party.
On Sunday, there were ten girls all dressed up as princesses for a tea party in the back yard. Marti undoubtedly had something to do with this, having introduced the dress-up tea party to the oldest daughter at our house, something that had a profound influence on her life. She speaks of it often and the fact that the youngest daughter picked this for her birthday party underlines that.
I had the fun of overhearing three of them talking.
“Why are we all dressed up?” said one.
“It’s a shindig,” said another.
“What’s a shindig?” said the first.
“It’s a big party,” said the first, and indeed it was. And it’s still going on.
“How long are you celebrating?” I asked the dad as he was working over the outside grill last night, getting ready for a new batch of guests.
“John, you need to understand something,” he answered. “When one of the women in my household has a birthday, we celebrate for 7 to 10 days. When one of the men has a birthday, we celebrate 7 to 10 hours. That’s just how it is.”
I’m not sure whether this has something to do with overall worth or that girls just wanna have fun but something about it seems intuitive. Guys are all for presents; they just don’t want to make much of a fuss about it. Get it over with and get back to whatever it was we were doing. Chandler’s birthday was something like that. He wasn’t very happy about any of the frills.
But Marti’s birthday is Friday, and we better have something going. She understands this. She is the one who engineered the “Very Happy Unbirthday Party” for all the women at Isaiah House without homes. Figuring that when you are homeless, you most likely do not celebrate your birthday, she decided to celebrate everyone’s birthday all together.
When you really think about it, all birthdays are big. God decided you should be. He created and named an eternal being. He started a life that cost him His son to save. Your birthday celebrates the fact that you were thought up in the mind of God and breathed into existence just like He breathed life into the first man and the first woman. And His desire is that you should live with Him forever.
I would take a few days to celebrate that, wouldn’t you?
John Fischer The Catch 
My husband’s birthday was last week–and I celebrated him ALL last week! With homemade meals–LOL! But I agree, his favorite part was the fact that I kept showering him with gifts 🙂
I’ve shared this before, but it is worth repeating. My friend’s daughter recently celebrated her 22nd birthday by performing 22 acts of “random kindness” to people who crossed her path that day (although confessed she stopped counting because she was having so much FUN). She contributed $10 to the grocery bill of the woman in line in front of her; she took donuts to the local fire station. She bought someone coffee on her break, and later bought lunch for someone she didn’t know. She helped a woman with small children load her groceries into her car; she held open doors for folks, took flowers to a retirement home and asked that they be placed in the room of someone who needed “cheering up.” She sent flowers to her mom. What a wonderful way to celebrate one’s birthday. What a wonderful way to celebrate life (yours and others) every day! BTW, I agree with Marti (and the Mad Hatter) that UNbirthdays can be more fun to celebrate than birthdays – send someone a “Happy Unbirthday” card today!
John, you need to buy a camera. I liked this story very much, but where are the pictures of the girls all dressed up having a tea party in the backyard? You’re articles would be soooo much better if you would have pictures of the people and events you’re writing about, rather than the generic pictures you use. Remember how many words a picture is worth? In this case, it would have been priceless. Anyhow, my two cents.
I’ll answer, yes I’d like to celebrate 4 a few days…
PS and i’ll 2nd Waitsel’s comments
PSS also i luv reading my other Catch buddy’s Carole’s post… 🙂
Your post reminded me that we haven’t heard about Isaiah House for awhile. What’s going on with those parties?