Today is my best friend’s birthday. She is a ray of sunshine in my life. She is many rays of sunshine in my life. She is many rays of sunshine in many people’s lives. She says that her momma pumped her full of sunshine as she was growing up and it must be true. So now she shares all that sunshine with anyone and everyone she meets. She has never met a stranger. (I meet strangers all the time, except I don’t actually meet them because they are strangers.) She is a warm, welcoming kind of person…the kind everyone likes to be around…because she is so sunny and happy and fun.
I didn’t meet Sunshine until I was 40-years-old, but I think she’s the best friend that I had been waiting for since I was 9. She understands my sense of humor…she gets me. I can make her laugh. She makes me laugh. When no one else is laughing, we’re laughing. It seems nothing is off limits to our funny bones. There are simply some more solemn happenings in life that we just don’t need to attend together because we might start laughing…the kind of laughing where it is hard to stop laughing. And all this laughter is good for me.
Not only does Sunshine share much laughter with me, I can share my heart with her. She’s always there to listen. She prays for me and for my family and the things I care about. She has taught me a lot about grace and forgiveness and how we’re all broken people. (I have perfectionist tendencies and she has taught me that imperfection is okay. We humans are all imperfect and broken in some way because we live in a broken and sin-stained world. Being broken is no problem because God can mend and use broken things and broken people.) She has taught me a lot about faith and simply believing God and what He says in His Word.
I’m so thankful for Sunshine!!!! I love her and listening to her…her stories about her family and the town she grew up in, her deep musings, her likes and dislikes…I love knowing her…Sunshine definitely makes me a better person and the world around her a better place.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SUNSHINE!!!!
pieces and ponderings 
That’s a great tribute. I bet you shine back on her. Have you told her about the kraut cake? And your kite flying trick? How about the movie with all the white-face people? Which reminds me – – though it’s not related – – why do they call them “washers”? Don’t they keep stuff from getting wet?