“Happy birthday!”
Those words bring a flood of memories to me and anyone else who hears them. Memories of cakes with frosting and flowers, fighting over getting a piece with a flower, clowns, magicians, silly games, friends – and those are all just from my 38th party. (Just kidding, I haven’t fought for a piece of cake with a flower since I was 35.)
This week I celebrated my birthday. For some odd reason, a birthday always feels special. You wake up feeling “Yeah, this is MY day! Today is a great day! I’m the MAN!” When I was a child my birthday really felt awesome. I was now a year getting closer to becoming “big”! Moving though my teenage years there were certain ages that were real milestones which were accompanied by feelings of giddiness. Thirteen – becoming a bar mitzvah, 16 – eligible to get my license, 18 – no longer a minor, 21 – able to drink (not that I ever do, even my Friday night Kiddush is made over grape juice, but at least I COULD if I now want to.)
As I have moved on in life the birthday started feeling a bit less joyous. After all, now it just means I am getting older! Where’s the joy in that? I don’t need a birthday to remind me of that, I have my receding hairline and aching knees to send me that message on a daily basis.
Despite the accompanying feelings of mortality and melancholy accompanying it, there is still something nice about my birthday. I wake up in the morning and feel like I am entitled to treat myself to something special (it used to be a doughnut, now it’s more like a package of Tums).
This year my birthday got me thinking - why is a birthday special? Why do perfect strangers, when hearing it’s your birthday, get all happy for you? Why does the office decide that everyone gets a cake to celebrate your birthday? (Probably because they all like cake and are happy to have an excuse to have some, actually.) Why do your wife and kids make you a special steak dinner like mine did for me the other night? (Special thanks to you Miriam, Dena, Malka and Tzvi – it was delicious!) In fact, if there was any event that LEAST deserves a celebration in one’s life it is his birthday! Is there
anything else in your life that you did less for to deserve a celebration? Think about it, the only thing you did was, wait for it now, be born! Wow, you came out of your mother! Amazing! And you were so amazing at it that not only do you and your family and entire circle of friends and even perfect strangers celebrate your great accomplishment, they all celebrate it again next year! And the following year! And every year following for the rest of your life!
Let’s face it, most people do things that are far more accomplishing and required more effort and perseverance than just being born. Learning to ride a bike was more of an accomplishment. Acing my
math test in 4th grade with Mrs. McKinney was more of an accomplishment. Reading from the Torah at
my Bar Mitzvah was more of an accomplishment. Going through yeshiva was more of an accomplishment. Passing the bar exam was more of an accomplishment. Even taking out the garbage on a weekly basis is more of an accomplishment! Yet none of these warrant a yearly celebration. So again I wonder -
WHY IS A BIRTHDAY SO SPECIAL?
I tried to look to the Torah for an answer. After all, the Torah contains the answer to everything!
The only reference I found in the Torah to birthdays was from the weekly portion just a few weeks ago. To my knowledge, this is the only instance where the Torah records someone making a feast to
celebrate his birthday. Know who it was? None other than King Pharaoh (Genesis 40:20)! Well, that’s not exactly a great role model, is it?
But maybe there is a lesson there for all of us. Certainly an egoist and self-centered person like Pharaoh celebrated his birthday because he felt that everything revolved around him. But perhaps King Pharaoh should have celebrated his birthday because he realized he was one of the most fortunate people on the
planet. After all, he was king of one of the most powerful empires in the entire world at the time.
Wealth and power were at his fingertips. He had a life that most people would be jealous of. In recognition of his great luck and good fortune, perhaps he could have chosen to celebrate the day he
was born as an expression of the joy he felt to be born to such a good lot.
We may not be kings of empires and not everyone has wealth and power at their fingertips. However, if we think about the good in our lives, the blessings we are given by G-d throughout our lives and on a daily basis, we can also express joy and gratitude on the day we were born to commemorate the great gift of life that G-d has given us.
I don’t know if this is at all answers my questions above (certainly not on a conscious level, perhaps on a subconscious one) but it is something that I try to incorporate as I make my journey through life and celebrate my yearly occasion as “my special day”. I can thank G-d for the day I was born and the lot He has given to me in my life with all of His kindness and blessings. Good health. Fantastic parents and siblings. A good education and upbringing. An incredible family with an amazing wife and awesome children. Good friends. Good personality traits. Bad personality traits that I can work on. And so on.
So as I move away from this birthday and clean the dishes from my steak dinner (yup, even being the birthday boy doesn’t get you off from everything!), I join all who share in my celebration not of what I have accomplished but rather what I have been blessed with by virtue of being born and the things I can continue to accomplish throughout this journey we all call “life.”
Now if you can please pass me a piece of my birthday cake, I’m ready for dessert. (And make sure I get a flower on mine!)
Shabbat Shalom!
Rabbi Yosef Koval
