{"id":70270,"date":"2024-03-12T16:40:58","date_gmt":"2024-03-12T09:40:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alternatech.net\/?p=70270"},"modified":"2024-03-20T12:03:35","modified_gmt":"2024-03-20T05:03:35","slug":"lonely-lady-gets-1st-birthday-cake-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/legendstitch.com\/lonely-lady-gets-1st-birthday-cake-ever\/","title":{"rendered":"Lonely Lady Gets 1st Birthday Cake Ever"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style='\"font-size:'>A childless elderly lady reached her one-hundredth birthday alone, with no one to celebrate with. A boy shows up at her door and he introduces himself as her great-grandson.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby was turning one hundred \u2013 an incredible landmark birthday, but there was no one to celebrate the moment with her.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby was alone, just as she\u2019d been for most of her life. When she was eight years old, her father had gone off to fight in the war. She had shouldered an adult\u2019s burden.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby\u2019s mother was a frail and distant woman, and her dad had taken Ruby aside.<strong> \u201cI\u2019m going to need you to be a big girl, Ruby,\u201d he\u2019d said seriously.<strong> \u201cYou\u2019re going to have to be very responsible and look after momma, OK?\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cOK, daddy,\u201d Ruby had answered, and that had been the end of her childhood. Ruby became the adult in the family and looked after her mother and her four younger siblings.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>She couldn\u2019t wait for daddy to come home, but he never did. At the age of 12, Ruby\u2019s family was informed that their father had d!ed in combat.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Daddy was never coming home. Mom fell apart, screaming and crying so much. A doctor had to come and give mom an injection, and then she was quiet and vague again.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cWhen you least expect it, life sends you a blessing.\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby\u2019s mom wasn\u2019t able to work and the pension she got from the Government was very small. Ruby gave up school and took a job at a nearby shop that sold fabric, threads, buttons, and ribbons \u2014 anything you\u2019d need to make clothes in those hard times.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>As Ruby was bright and energetic, she soon became an asset to the woman who owned the haberdashery, Mrs. Dorris. Just like Ruby\u2019s mom, Mrs. Dorris was a war widow, and she was kind to Ruby in her way.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Sometimes, she\u2019d give Ruby off-cuts from the prettiest prints and bits of colorful ribbons so she could make herself little shift dresses. Ruby often used the fabric on her siblings, and on her mom.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Mom had become even more distant as she grew older. She drifted around the house in her nightgown, and Ruby had to watch, so she didn\u2019t go outside like that.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby insisted that her four sisters would finish school, and she didn\u2019t allow them to go to work to help out.<br>\n<span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cFocus on school,\u201d she\u2019d tell them sternly. <strong>\u201cThat\u2019s the biggest help you can give us!\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby turned eighteen, and enjoyed her birthday with no party, no presents, no birthday cake. Mrs. Dorris didn\u2019t know or didn\u2019t care \u2014 she was an unemotional kind of woman.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Mom was lost in her own world, while Ruby\u2019s sisters, with the innate selfishness of children, didn\u2019t even realize that Ruby, too, had birthdays.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>That was the year Ruby met Brad \u2013 a tall and slim man with a shy smile. He came to the shop to buy needles for his mom and stayed to talk to Ruby.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>They started \u2018stepping out,\u2019 as people called it back then. They went out dancing and to the movies, and parked and kissed on Lover\u2019s Lane. Then the kissing led to more.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby discovered she was pregnant, and Brad told her he\u2019d marry her, they\u2019d have a pretty house and raise their children and be very happy. Then Ruby told him about mom and the girls.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cI have to look after them, Brad,\u201d Ruby told him.<strong> \u201cI promised my father. But in a few years, the girls will be finished with school, and it will be only mom.\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cYour crazy mother and your sisters are moving in with us?\u201d Brad asked. <strong>\u201cFor the rest of our lives? Is that what you\u2019re telling me?\u201d After that, Brad was very quiet.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>While he agreed to meet the next day and make the arrangements for the wedding, he didn\u2019t kiss Ruby goodbye the way he usually did. Ruby never saw him again.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>She learned that he\u2019d volunteered for the new war in Asia that very afternoon. He\u2019d left her all alone and pregnant. <strong>\u201cWhat am I going to do?\u201d she asked herself.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>She wondered what kind of life she could give the baby if she kept the baby. She had to work all the time to raise her sisters and look after her mother. She couldn\u2019t leave the baby with mom while she worked; it just wasn\u2019t safe.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby pressed her hands to her tummy and wept. She\u2019d have to give up her child. She\u2019d give it up for adoption and know that he or she would be loved and cherished.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>The moment when she gave up her newborn daughter was among the hardest in Ruby\u2019s life, but she knew she was doing it for the best reasons.<strong> \u201cBe happy, my sweet girl,\u201d she whispered.<strong> \u201cI love you.\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>That was more years ago than Ruby cared to remember, and the last time she\u2019d felt young. After Brad, Ruby never looked at another man. She knew that whatever happened, they would never accept her burdens, and she couldn\u2019t ask them to.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>One by one, her sisters finished school and left home. They got married and moved away, and Ruby was left to care for mom, as always. Ruby was seventy-three when her mom passed away.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>That day Ruby wept, not just for her mother, but for the bitter waste of an entire life. She had nothing. No family, and since her retirement, few friends.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cI\u2019ll just wait to d!e,\u201d Ruby told herself.<strong> \u201cIt can\u2019t be long now.\u201d But it was. Ruby was a sturdy woman in the best of health, and pretty soon, she turned eighty, then ninety\u2026\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>The years passed unmarked by any celebration. No one cared. Ruby sat in her little house and grew older and older. When she turned ninety-nine, a social worker showed up.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>She wanted to see if Ruby was capable of living on her own. She looked around and was quite happy with her living conditions. She left without wishing Ruby a happy birthday.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cOne hundred,\u201d Ruby said to herself. <strong>\u201cI\u2019ve seen a century of this world\u2019s history and lived none of it.\u201d She was sitting in her kitchen and thinking about her life when the doorbell rang.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>She got up and opened the door. There was a young man there, and he was holding a huge cake with a big 100 on top of it. <strong>\u201cHi Gran!\u201d he cried cheerfully. <strong>\u201cHappy birthday!\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby\u2019s chin dropped. <strong>\u201cYoung man, you have the wrong house\u2026\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cNo, I don\u2019t,\u201d he said gently. \u201cYou are my great-grandmother Ruby. My grandmother always wanted to know who her birth mother was, so when she turned 81, I had the records unsealed.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cNo one imagined you were still alive! Gran\u2019s outside, in the car, waiting to meet you \u2014 if you agree.\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cMy daughter?\u201d Ruby asked. <strong>\u201cShe\u2019s\u2026Does she want to meet me? I\u2026I gave her up\u2026I wanted her to be happy\u2026\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cShe knows that gran,\u201d the young man said. <strong>\u201cWe also know you\u2019ve been alone for a long time, but now you have a family: a daughter, five grandchildren, and fifteen great-grandchildren!\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby started sobbing, and the young man put his arms around her. <strong>\u201cIt\u2019s OK,\u201d he said. <strong>\u201cWe\u2019re here now, and you\u2019re going to have quite a party!\u201d\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>Ruby met her daughter, her grandchildren, and her great-grandchildren, and it was the best day of her life. They lit the candles on the cake and sang <strong>\u2018Happy Birthday.\u2019 It was the most beautiful sound Ruby had ever heard.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'><strong>\u201cMy life wasn\u2019t a waste after all,\u201d she whispered to her daughter. <strong>\u201cI had you!\u201d\n<h4><span style='\"font-size:' color:>What can we learn from this story?\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>\u2013 Duty can be a terrible burden, but life always brings a reward.\n<p><span style='\"font-size:'>\u2013 When you least expect it, life sends you a blessing.\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A childless elderly lady reached her one-hundredth birthday alone, with no one to celebrate with. A boy shows up at her door and he introduces himself as her great-grandson. Ruby was turning one hundred \u2013 an incredible landmark birthday, but there was no one to celebrate the moment with her. Ruby was alone, just as\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":70272,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"A childless elderly lady reached her one-hundredth birthday alone, with no one to celebrate with. 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