To the Shadchan:

 I am married for the second time after being divorced for a relatively short period. My first marriage lasted almost 30 years. As newlyweds, we don’t host much, nor do we go out except to our children nearby. (Covid started just as we finished our shana rishona.) We do try to invite at least one single person for Yom Tov meals, as we know how difficult it is to celebrate these days alone.

Our guest on Rosh Hashanah was a woman who has been trying to find a shidduch for many years and whom we know well. We were enjoying the meal when she said, “You two are so lucky to have found each other,” which we confirmed. From that beginning, she started asking questions, such as how long we dated, did I know that my husband is picky about certain things, etc. Then she asked if we had “tested” each other. I asked her what she meant by testing, and she said that a friend of hers once got tickets for a date to the opera, and since there was a woman singing in it and the man didn’t refuse to go, she concluded that he didn’t care about kol isha and nixed the shidduch!

It took me a while to connect all the dots. There was our two-hour wait in the rental car line, our new dining room table that was promised to arrive any day but got held up for months at port, the endless dealership invites to sell my 2017 vehicle for top dollar, the repeated delays of our early Friday morning Southwest flight (that finally got us home an hour before Shabbos), and the months-long wait for a dented refrigerator door replacement.

The list goes on and on – across the board and across the globe. Product lines, professional services, food establishments, educational institutions, and more, in every state, every country, and every continent. For months, we have all experienced the trickle-down effects of this unprecedented labor shortage in one way or another. I went behind the scenes of just a few of these workplaces to do some investigation.

“He said to them: Go and see which is the good way to which a man should cleave…Rabbi Eliezer says: One who considers the consequences [of his actions]…” (Avos 2:9)

We are about to embark on a grand experiment in our community. This experiment will not be a planned or controlled experiment, but a natural one born from the human tendency toward inertia. We are the guinea pigs, but we are also the ones running the experiment.

Peter Kurz has two foremost passions in life: Israel and baseball. As a ten-year-old from the Upper West Side in New York City, he traveled to Israel for the first time in 1967, and began his lifelong love of the Jewish state. Two years later, in 1969, the New York Mets won the World Series, defeating the Baltimore Orioles, which solidified his love of baseball.

Despite making aliyah in 1976, Kurz did not abandon his passion for the American national pastime. Yet Kurz’s penchant for baseball has often been a lonely experience for him in Israel, a country where basketball and soccer are substantially more popular. He has dedicated much of his professional life to changing the perception of baseball among Israelis. In 1998, he began coaching the sporadic local Israeli Little League team and worked his way up to secretary-general, president of the Israel Baseball Association, and now general manager of the national Israeli baseball team.

“President Biden told the world on Monday, August 16, that he doesn’t regret his decision to withdraw rapidly from Afghanistan, or even the chaotic, incompetent way the withdrawal has been executed. He is determined in retreat, defiant in surrender, and confident in the rightness of consigning the country to jihadist rule.” So did a Wall Street Journal editorial of August 16, 2021 aptly sum up the situation.

With the Taliban’s victorious entry into Kabul in mid-August 2021, the American military intervention in Afghanistan has come full circle. Undertaken to destroy Al Qaeda following its deadly 9/11 attack on American soil, and to remove Afghanistan as a base for global terrorism, it has now, 20 years later, ended up where it began. Instead of building on the significant progress achieved, it is witnessing the triumphant return of those terrorists in a stronger position than ever. President Biden’s assertion that the U.S. “mission” had been accomplished is exposed as the boldface lie it is by the glaring reality of the shameful rout.

According to the fifth chapter in Pirkei Avos, I am now between “a ripe old age” and “showing strength.” May G-d please continue to bestow His blessings upon me, my wife, our children, and grandchildren.

We live our lives in uncharted territory. Each stage brings new opportunities and challenges. The famous words from “Fiddler on the Roof” come to mind:

Sunrise, sunset…Swiftly go the years

One season following another, laden with happiness and tears

Is this the little girl I carried? Is this the little boy at play?

I don’t remember growing older; when did they?”

The benefits of regular exercise for our physical and mental well-being are well known. This was especially true during the height of the pandemic, and many of us took the opportunity to get out and walk around our neighborhoods, Quarry Lake, Meadowbrook Park and other local nature areas. Baltimoreans are also blessed to have beautiful walking/hiking/biking trails along local abandoned railroad lines. In addition to the exercise, these make for a wonderful family outing on Chol Hamoed Sukkos or anytime. Described below are some of the most accessible and popular.

The pandemic has helped us learn at least two vital messages very well. We all learned not to take anything in life for granted. Not family gatherings, events, our daily schedules, hugs – or even our own breath. We’ve learned to appreciate everything more as we now have seen that it can all be taken away – and quickly.

Another vital message we have learned is how important it is to strengthen our immune systems. When young people are given the chance to joyfully learn the skills needed to keep the immune system strong from a very early age, we are doing what is within our power to help them lead healthy, happy, and long lives.

With cell phone in pocket or purse, we are all photographers these days. It’s so easy. Film has gone the way of the typewriter, and everything is digital. No need to load the camera; no need to turn the film to the next frame. The pace of life is fast, and it can be captured at an equally fast pace in pictures that preserve our most precious memories.

There are cameras on our doors, too, and on our PCs and laptops, in the streets, and in all kinds of buildings. The cameras keep clicking, covertly capturing our activities, and we do not always get to smile.

It’s that glorious time of the year when the crape myrtle trees are in full bloom. I never saw these trees any place but Baltimore although they’re known to grow throughout the southeastern part of the country. Picture medium-sized trees laden with large tufts of blossoms in gorgeous colors. When we moved here, I was simply amazed when I first saw them. I’m used to seeing flowering trees in the springtime, long before their leaves first appear. Crape myrtle trees only start blooming in July but can continue into September. For a flower lover like me, they are truly a sight to behold.