A beautiful gift

I got something given to me, a gift from a friend. This is a different kind of gift than you might expect, one that I am certain not many people 'round these parts have ever been given. It is a gift that took time and courage to give. It is an ancient gift with more history and culture wrapped up in it than my existence can even comprehend. It is a gift that after given is not able to be given back or re-gifted, yet I can in some ways re-gift it to you by telling you about it. It goes everywhere with me until it is warn out. This gift comes with a blessing that isn't spoken it's just felt. It says "You and I have been together. I am so proud to be your friend." And the blessing is reciprocated.

So what is it?
The gift --- My friend from Sudan dyed my toes with henna.

This is how it went  - Picture a beautiful park and large group of women from many cultures gathered around, with all eyes on my toes. Hawa took my foot up on her knee and started to apply the henna paste she had just mixed, she formed it onto the ends of my toes. It was a very precise working of the paste so that each cap had a good shape and clean edges. Then she put tiny wood chips between my toes to keep the toes separated. After the second foot was done I let them dry for 3 hours. My friend Elexis got her finger tips done. Hawa told us that this is a special thing done for women in parts of Africa for their wedding or when they are having a baby( Put the brakes on the rumor mill - neither of us are in these categories, all for fun). I felt humbled to be a part of this very rich and elegant tradition. On a whim I asked her about the henna, not thinking of anything that had come before it or would come after it.

So what did come after? Well. at first my toes were orange and I laughed. They made others laugh. People questioned why I did it. They turned brown. I got more mixed reactions from people and I learned some things about myself. They turned black.  Elexis and I started a support group to handle the negative reactions and I processed more lessons learned. I embraces them and I decorated them with some Cindy-style creativity and most of all I recognized what a gift I had received. Now three weeks later the colour has faded and all it back to normal but am I back to normal? ok ok some of you would never have considered me normal to start with and I can appreciate that but truly you know what I mean.

Here are some fresh thoughts/lessons born out of this gift and experience:

- Beauty is subjective for humanity. We are part of a very diverse world that has many ideas about beauty.
- No one but God can define perfect beauty and I am almost certain his definition has nothing to do with the outside skin-deep beauty.
- It caused me to think - When someone comes in the room looking 'different' how do I react? Inside thoughts or outward actions?
- What people think of me matters but maybe in someways it shouldn't matter so much.

I encourage you to see people and their styles of beauty as beautiful even if it's not your choice of beauty.