I saw this in an article by a Rabbi. She quoted an idea attributed to another Rabbi and it said “the day you were born was the day God decided that the world could not exist without you.” She said it meant that there is a reason each one of us was created. She said “search for the reason you were born. Discover the contribution that only you can make to the world.” Her name is Rabbi Miriam Cotzin Burg. Her thoughts are very beautiful and meaningful.

In my youth there were no female Rabbis. Males were the leaders of the synagogue. Males were the physicians and other medical people. We females have come a long way.

It is nice to think that the world could not exist without each of us. I guess each of us has that contribution in us to make to the world. I do not think our contribution may be for the world, but could be for our individual area of the world. Mothers can take care of their children, fathers and mothers work for the necessary monetary contributions to our individual world. Grandparents can give love and toys to their grandchildren. Even a little or large dog can add love to a family.

I never wanted to visit my brother when he got married, because he had a semi-large dog. Before, I would visit, I would call to let them know I was coming and they put the dog in the cellar for the time span of my calling. I think back and think, poor doggie, Aunties and Sister was coming and you were relegated to the bottom of the house.

Then when I bought my two doggies, one at a time, I knew the love you have for your pet. He or she becomes a part of the family and when you go out and come home and she (in our case, both females) await you like you are the Queen arriving for a visit, then you know pure accounted for love from a four legged family member.

The kids had an aquarium of assorted fish and one evening we came home, and the big and expensive fish had taken his dinner and eaten up the other fish. We had not asked if this could happen when we purchased him and he was a resident of the fish bowl. He came in and was very nice and attentive to the other fishes and then he turned on them and he waited for us to leave for a few hours. Then he attempted his assault on his roommates and alas, they were all gone.  He was gone too by the next day in return for his mean way of eating dinner. We dismantled the aquarium and not having fish for another added family member was changed to having doggies.

I had a friend and she talked about her Jennifer Jo and I thought this was her daughter. One day, she mentioned she had taken Jenn Jo to the vet and then and only then, did I know JJ was a pet, a dog. She and her husband loved this creature with a regular and constant love. They had no children, so she was their ‘child.’ I could understand this easily because now I had pets too.

Once she had a neighbor’s dog come to ‘visit’ Jenn Jo because she thought JJ should have a dog friend, other than her and her husband. JJ did not like the other visiting dog and barked the whole hour while the guest was visiting on her domain and property. JJ was content with her human parents and with being the queen of the castle, as their only ‘child.’

The Rabbi said we are all put here on this Earth for our contributions. She said to search for the reason we are born. Some may say, certain people are here to be healers, others to be givers of advice, others to be caregivers, others to be teachers, others to be writers of news and disseminators of ideas, others to be daughters and sons to our aged parents, who need them now, others to play sports or act in shows or TV or movies to give us pleasure when we watch them perform or others just here to be what we want to be. My friends in Steilacoom, Washington, who I write about often, could say they are put on this Earth to go every year for over twenty-five years to the state of Hawaii, to go there and to teach and demonstrate ballroom dancing before these people. Their names are Steven Behr and Mary Peterson. Sometimes, I vainly think, I am put here at this time in my senior life to talk about ballroom dancing and what it can mean in seniors’ lives and also for younger folks too. I know that when Mom became widowed, I was put here to help her and to assist her to find a new life for herself without her beloved Joseph who had been with her for thirty-seven years of married life. That I did and she went on for the next twenty years to have a fine life, working at a job she liked, traveling to places that she had dreamed of visiting and being a grandparent.

 There is a saying that states “everyone is beautiful in their own way, they just have to see it themselves first.” I have a friend who was unable to get her hair colored as she often did about every two months. So of course, at her senior age, the gray started to come through. One day, a receptionist in a doctor’s office told her “I just love your gray hair, it is becoming.” Then on a second visit there, she repeated the same thing. My friend finally said “if you love gray hair that much, how come yours is dyed dark brown?” The lady looked at her and walked away. My friend was put here that day to come back with a good remark to the woman who was giving her an empty so called left handed compliment, which in turn irritated her a lot. The following week she got a chance to get her hair colored to her normal color and when she went to visit the office again, the receptionist never said a word to her how nice her hair looked. She pretended she did not see the color, because she had been responded to in the way she deserved to be talked to. So now, when the color was restored and my friend looked more like herself, the person who tried to destroy my friend’s ego with her stupid remark, was not lady enough to compliment the new situation.

My friend was beautiful with or without her color, because her inner beauty shone through and if you measured it against the receptionist, the number would have been ten to zero in inner and outer beauty and the ten being for my friend and the zero for the mean one.

Another quote is this: “remember outer beauty is a reflection of your inner beauty, your self-confidence and how you feel about the things you do. If you don’t feel beautiful, you won’t look beautiful. If your confidence is up and you are feeling good about your thoughts, values; and personality, it will create an outer beauty that does not really have to do with shapes or forms.”

As Mom taught us, if you have nothing to say of value or kindness, say nothing at all.

We are put here to be kind, considerate and hopefully happy. Then and only then, can we shine and have outer and inner beauty and when that happens, we will be the people, we are supposed to be. To give a compliment and to make someone feel good and confident, surely shows we are kind and confident our self. That line is an Elita saying.