I attended a very important birthday party last month. My favorite uncle was 90 years old. One might expect a gentleman of those years to quietly receive close family at his fireside on the occasion, but not sold my uncle. He opened his modest home and over 125 friends old and you came to visit and pay their respects. You see, my uncles friends mean a great deal to him. During the afternoon I asked one of the young guests there if he had 125 friends who would call on his birthday. He said, "If I had a party for all my real friends, we could hold it in a clothes closet and not be crowded." That's sad, isn't it, but so true of the modern generation. So often we pick our friends for business reasons. We entertain "them" because they entertained "us"! We mix dinner parties with insurance policies and card parties with real estate, never being sure if we are liked for what we are. My uncle, God bless him, has real friends. Friends who fetch his mail and clean his walks. Friends who write him when he's ill and visit him when he's well. Friends who call because they love the man for what he is, a gentle, good man in the truest sense of the words. Such friendships are rare indeed in this hectic day and age. I thought as I watched this beloved gentleman, sometime soon he must go. When he does, 200, yes perhaps 300 eyes will cry bitter tears. I asked myself "How many would cry over you”?
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