Miracles & Appreciation

chanukah is a time of miracles. it's also a time of appreciation. we thank Hashem for the miracles He performed at that time and for all He does until today.

i just heard of a family who i know of whose house burnt down! tonite- after candle lighting they left and came back to find their house completely gone. kids are traumatized. everyone's in shock.

my neighbor went to sloan-kettering memorial hospital today to visit a 23 year old who's sick. he is a baal teshuva who learned for a year in yeshiva, got married and then three months later was diagnosed and it's been downhill from then on. he can't even talk anymore it's so bad.

you can't take anything for granted anymore. life is precious. everyday things are miracles. it's a miracle i'm alive and well and healthy B"H and my family as well. B"H we have what we need, we have a house (unlike this family that is now HOMELESS). these things happen and put everything in perspective. it's like now i realize that little things shouldn't bother me cuz they're so NOT important. they're just "little things."

im so grateful i got to work ok today and didn't slip on the icy sidewalks.

im grateful i have a job.

im grateful for my family.

for my friends. for my neighbors.

im grateful that i afford to buy what i want. grateful i can go to israel.

im grateful i can get wake-up calls like these (though unfortunate they are) to realize how lucky i am to have what i have and be who i am.

ps. his tehillim name is reuven ben sara. please daven!

*UPDATE*

Baruch Dayan HaEmes- reuven ben sara was niftar this morning. May he be a mailitz yosher for all of us.

inspiration

my sister wrote this poem called "Holding On" a few years back:

I'm inspired.

The speaker spoke

Of her journey to

Becoming frum.

She changed her life:

Maybe I can too in my 

Own small ways.

"Her clothes were so ugly,"

They're saying.

"She kept moving her

Hands as she spoke.

I was inspired.

Doubts creep into my mind

And cloud my thoughts of

Growth and self-improvement.

They trample the speech with

Their words.

They trample my inspiration.

I try to push away their words

And my doubts.

But it's hard to hold on to 

Inspiration.

It happens to me all the time. I get inspired and it doesn't last. 

When i was in high school, we read an article in class about inspiration and how to make it last. You have to make something concrete to remind you of it so you can hold onto it forever. 

But its so hard. 

There's this woman i know who's suffering from breast cancer (a mother of two little girls) and they've been thru so much, even before this happened. She just had surgery last week. I was asked to help out a little bit so i volunteered to go friday mornings at 7 am. i came back about an hour ago from there. i came back inspired. life is so short- gotta make the people you love important to you and do the right things. but now, even an hour later, its gone (well, almost).  and i don't want to let it go.