Honesty

     Being frum is not about compartmentalization. Its a way of life. I think that often people forget this . Hence the recent ponzi schemes perpetrated by frum Jews. Yes, I will call them frum Jews. They probably are very makpid on kemach yoshon and would never consider relying on the Flatbush eruv. They just are able to compartmentalize their frumkeit into one  basket and their business mores into a different basket.
     Rosh Hashanah is upon us. It is a time to reflect and resolve to do better next year. Of course those who really need to be listening to this are not reading blogs, but I will continue anyway. It is time to be careful in business . I have seen too many very frum looking people trying to take advantage of weaker trusting people in business. It makes me sick. Frum people are not the only ones who do this, but that is not justification. If people paid more attention to being honest in business than in the measurements of women's clothing  we would be living in a better world. Maybe then mashiach would come.

evil lurks

today i found out one of my co-workers has been back -stabbing my employer. i cant go in to details, but its really pissing me off. id love to expose the situation , but im afraid what the fallout may be. im glad im aware of the situation , but it sickens me that such folly is happening and that the back stabber is getting away with it. my only comfort is that the back-stabber might get sloppy and get caught.
the thing is , what the back stabber is doing clearly affects one of my co-worker's livelihoods. i dont know how she can live with herself. even worse... there are for sure some partners in this crime otherwise she would not have gotten so far with this scheme. where's a superhero when the day needs saving?

unbalanced

after reading frumkeptic's most recent post do frum people believe in gd ,it got me thinking of the past....

years ago i dated a guy who had a quandary. he couldnt reconcile how someone could be frum and not be a completely upstanding individual. you know the type.... shomer shabbos, but have horrible midos...... wear the most tzanuah oufits, but cruel to their employees....only eat yoshon and yet channel their inner bernie madoff... you catch my drift. this chap was a bt.

of course all of us bt or otherwise have to reconcile this imbalance, but for a bt this is especially trying. they became frum because they believed the torah way to be more perfect than the secular route, and if all of those who have seen the light dont fully uphold it , then what?

as a teenager i had grappled with such issues, eventually coming to the conclusion that people are people , frum or not. just because there are those who identify themselves as frum who are not the most righteous, it doesnt invalidate the torah. one cannot judge the validity of the torah by those who follow it. i tried to convey these thoughts to my friend, but i dont know if he got it.

at the time i was afraid this quandary might cause this young chap to leave frumkeit. it is now so long ago. i wonder if he is still frum. and if he's still frum, is he still single???

matters of identity

when i first started blogging i didnt tell anyone because i just wanted to see who would happen upon my site. i was also kind of shy about people i actually know reading my posts. eventually i got over it and told some of my friends that i have a blog. usually my friends would read a few posts and then that would be it. so much for feeling nervous about friends reading my blog!

a few of my friends do read regularly as well as one of my brothers. i think it keeps me honest. if you write so anonymously you can forget that real people are reading your thoughts. if i ask myself if i would mind if one of my friends specifically read my posts it makes it more real, instead of just me typing on my computer.

older than the trees in the forest

when i was growing up my mom would always say that she was older than the trees in the forest. years later she said that she didnt really care if my siblings and i knew her age , its just that sometimes kids blab and she didnt want the whole world discussing her age.
my grandmother on the other hand had a different tactic. she was always 29. although at some point we kids figured out she couldnt be 29 if our dad was 33 (dad being a guy ,revealed his age). grandma looked good for over 29 , but she didnt look younger than my dad.
when i was in high school my mom came up with the concept of how she wouldnt mind attending my dad's high school reunion, but she didnt want to attend hers. she would look like "the young wife" at my dad's reunion, but at her own reunion the men's younger wives were younger than the women who had been in their graduating class.
as a kid i didnt quite grasp this concept, as an adult i do.
there was a gem of an episode on the john laroquette show where john went to a party and met a woman who appeared his age. when he asked her for her number she told him she didnt usually date men his age. this of course put poor john in a tailspin. he suddenly was looking in to plastic surgery. in the end the woman revealed her real age , which was significantly older than john. the woman had alot of work done which kept her well preserved.
years ago i met a shadchan who said that its okay to lie about ones age by two years because if someone found out the truth, two years wouldnt be a deal breaker.
one must be careful when lying about ones age. if you say you are 10 yrs younger than you are, you better look it. if you dont people will catch on. its probably better to say you are older. this way you will look great. if you are really 30 but say you are 40 , everyone will say"gee, he looks really great for forty!" if you are really 30 and say you are 25, but you look every inch like you are 30, you arent doing yourself any favors.
as for me... well.. im older than the trees in the forest, and thats my final answer!!!