Later

    A lifetime ago when I was in college I was hit by a car. I don't want to go into all of the gory details, but one of the results was having to use a cane for several months until I healed.
     Recently a friend of mine fell and started using a cane because she had trouble walking. Her mother had a cane that she sometimes uses , so my friend started using it. Incorrectly. When I was given the cane years ago I was taught how to use it and I could not control myself and instructed my friend on how to use her cane. After she used the cane properly she thanked my because she felt better . At the time I told her that I am glad that something good came out of my injury years ago. There is nothing else in my life B"H that would have taught me how to use a cane . Just that.
     I bet that there are so many things in life like this that no one even recognizes. I am sure that this has happened other times in my own life but I never paid attention to it.
     

Rabbi Jacob, y va danser !

     This is really funny. Its strange to think this was filmed in France 40 years ago.

9-11-2016

    Its 9/11 again.  Its been fifteen years since 9/11/2001 and it still brings tears to my eyes as I watch them reading the never ending list of names of those who lost their lives at  what was the site of the World Trade Center. Its uncanny to see some of the children of those who died on 9/11 who never met their fathers. They are already 14 or 15 years old. Has that much time passed? Is the world any better since then?
      I still remember 9/11/2001 as one of the most frightening days in my life. I was not at the WTC when it happened but I was in Manhattan at the time. I was at work further uptown. When I left work that day I could see the smoke of the attack . It was that thick. For days there was the drone of helicopters protecting New Yorkers . The week after was Rosh Hashanah. It was so strange to celebrate the Jewish Holidays so close to such devastation.
      When I woke up on 9/12/2001 I remember thinking "Now What?" The world was just never going to be the same. America was never going to be the same. They had tried to blow up the WTC  eight years before but they had not succeeded. I hadn't forgotten about that. Apparently neither had the nefarious terrorists. I remember walking through the shops at the WTC  the summer of 2001  and thinking about the failed attempt on the trade center. It felt eerie. I had no idea what was yet to come a few months later.
        It rained heavily in NYC on 9/10/2001. I was on the subway going home that day and one of the poles people hold onto on the  train fell off and someone picked it off the floor and took it home. I had never seen one of those  break.
         9/11/2001 was a beautiful sunny day. It was also very hot. I had plans to do the errands I could not have done on the rainy 9/10/2001. I also had a date planned for that day. Needless to say my plans for that day changed . I left  work early that day but no one could leave the city at first because they had stopped all of the trains until later in case any of the accomplices were trying to escape. In the end I stayed with friends who lived in Manhattan. I did not go home until 9/12/2001.
        I know two people who had brothers who died at the WTC. I found out about the passing of one of them when I saw a note on the "wailing wall" at Grand Central station giving my friend as the person to contact because his brother was one of the missing people. I know a few people who escaped the WTC as it was going down.
         You could not forget that day . For weeks I would see the smoke of the burning WTC as I was on the train from Brooklyn to Manhattan every morning. 9/11 was all anyone could talk about for weeks afterward. Everyone was in mourning. The world as we knew it had changed forever.

The Freedom Tower  in lower Manhattan 2016

      In memory of those who lost their lives so tragically on 9/11/2001. The world is not the same without them. 

REBBETZIN ESTHER JUNGREIS APPEARS ON “TUESDAY NIGHT LIVE IN JERUSALEM”

    Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis passed away yesterday at the age of 80. She was quite an inspiring woman. A holocaust survivor from Hunagary, she founded the kiruv organization Hineni.
    Rebbtzin Jungreis was the only kiruv person who I have ever hear speak who could intertwine snippets of pop culture into her lectures and get it right. She was able to meld the ancient teachings with the present and make it relevant. I was especially impressed that as a very frum woman that she embarked on such a path. At one point it was hip for 20's and 30's something singles to attend her Tuesday night lectures in order to possible meet their bashert during the socializing after the lecture.
    Rebbetzin Jungreis's funeral was today. Its hard to say goodbye to that spunky petite woman whose mission in life was to spread the word of the Torah . She will be missed. 

Matisyah at Moshava Camp

   These kids are never going to forget this summer. I went to Camp Moshava in Wild Rose , Wisconsin. We never had any surprise guests like this back then.

בקיצור : Pokemon GO In Israel

   Yes, Pokemon Go is in Israel. Here is a  video all about it. Enjoy!

OTD

     After reading a lot of stories of  chasidim  who have gone off the derech it has changed how I view them. I used to think that just by how they look that they must be on another spiritual plane . Now I realize that that same chasidic garbed individual may really be someone who is plotting their freedom from it. One cannot tell just by looking at a person's dress how sincere their actions are. Truthfully, I always  believed  this about people's externals. I  never thought that someone's dress defined the intensity of their religious fervor . Now I believe it even more.
     No matter how religious or non-religious a person grows up one needs to figure out where one fits in and feels comfortable.
      One more thing,,,, Judaism  isn't all or nothing. Its lots of shades of grey,