COVID-19, one can sink or swim, withdraw or rescue, bewail unfair portions or cherish the blessings. My aunt Zelda, who loved to walk and devoured poetry, always quoted two opposing phrases, often in unblinking succession: “Ah, the vicissitudes of life!” and “If life gives you lemons make lemonade.” This re-minds me of Rabbi Simcha Bunam of Pzhysha’s injunction: “Everyone must have two pockets . . . In his right pocket are to be the words: ‘For my sake was the world created,’ and in his left: ‘I am but dust and ashes.’” Instead of throwing away one piece of paper in favor of the other, it is possible, perhaps beneficial, to acknowledge the duality. On May 27, 2020, less than four months after the country’s […]
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