LIFE

I have a legacy that I inherited from my Zaidy (grandfather). The legacy is called LIFE. He was shot (alive) into a grave by the Nazis (machshemo). Left for dead he made a choice. Stay, don’t move and by default die. No one could or would judge such a decision. If I were in his place then, with (God forbid) my family murdered, my home and life destroyed, would I have the strength, the desire, to do anything, but lie there and let death take over me? Not my Zaidy, Zalman ben Chana z’l, whose yertziet was this week, no, my Zaidy he got up, with a shot leg, and walked the walk of life.

He went, he escaped, he lived each day of his life.

He started anew, no not at the age of twenty, but at fifty. New wife (my beloved Bubbie a’h), new family, new country, new journey. When he immigrated to the US he was nearly sixty.

So thank God I inherited this legacy. A legacy that teaches that age is only a number. Failure and success are irrelevant. The only thing that is left up to you is to try. It’s in my blood, my genetic make-up, both nature and nurture it’s a part of me. It’s how I live my life.

And yes, last year at the age of forty I went back to school to study trauma therapy and addictions counseling and I had another baby. When I told my teenage son that I want to learn to become a volunteer paramedic he said, “Mommy, don’t you think you have enough to do?” I laughed, maybe he’s right, but I know myself and if God wills it, one day I’ll try.

Now the other night I had a client and her story was one of the saddest that I have heard in a long while. Why? Because this beautiful woman is suffering from the worst pain that there is-an illness of sadness. She has the illness of “I have no more strength, no desire, no will to do or to try.” This woman, who in someone’s eyes, might have it all, is not living. She’s so young and yet she acts so old.

For forty-eight hours I lived Rosh Hashanna with the thoughts,

“Hashem, please, please let Your Will be my will, please Hashem, give me life!” I thought of this woman and I begged that she, that everyone should have the will, the desire to be alive.

It was one of the simplest Rosh Hashanna’s that I prepared in terms of physicality and one of the most beautiful ones I had in terms of spirituality. After hearing the shofar blasts I walked home (I did not pray in the shul as on Rosh Hashanna my job is to take care of my little ones who need me) and thanked God for each part of my body from the hair on my head to the nails on my toes. A bone, a muscle, an organ, a blood vessel, a vein, an artery-how could I possibly thank Him for the grandness and goodness which He bestows upon me?

I am sitting here and I am alive and that’s a miracle.

And as we know there are no coincidences in life. The parsha

of my Zaidy’s passing from this world to the next is the one in which Moshe Rabbeinu “went” and he spoke to all Israel. It was on the last day of his life. Moshe knew that he was on that day going to die and yet he still went and gathered the nation and told them, “The Lord He is the One Who goes before you; He will be with you; He will neither fail you, nor forsake you. Do not fear, and do not be dismayed (Devarim 31:8).” That’s right, even when he knew it was his last day of life in this world he didn’t, at age 120, stop to live his life. He continued to encourage and lead his people until Hashem took his soul away from him.

I am sitting here and I am alive and that’s a miracle. I have a

legacy of LIFE, but you know what, so do you. And I bless you that you should always connect to the LIFE.

Pray, pray for life and thank God for each and every moment of it.

The children are calling me and it’s almost time to light.

I want to write more, but I have no time. May these words be an elevation for the soul of my beloved Zaidy, a refuah shleima for the baby of our nephew and niece, HaTinok harach ben Jessica, born at week 33 on the same day as the yertziet of my Zaidy.

I am grateful and indebted to YRM and her husband for giving me this laptop, may they always be on the side of giving and may I use it to help people and spread Torah.

Gmar Chatima Tova, Shabbat Shalom,

Elana