As I was getting ready to take my triplets to preschool this week, the middle one—Dovid—had a massive tantrum. Before I could register what he was doing, he went to the cupboard where we store the snacks, emptied out the entire box, and proceeded to trample on each and every bag.
All this in literally seconds.
Fortunately, my wife was there and able to hold him, and once he’d calmed down, he chose a snack and went on happily to school as if nothing had happened. I took him to the car and watched him carefully, but there was absolutely no remnant of his bad mood. It was almost as if an entirely different child had been raging in anger, trampling on all the snacks. He went to school happily and was in a good mood for the rest of the day.
That night, I lay in bed with him and asked him about his day. He chattered happily about school and the friends he played with … no mention of the one thing I was still fixated on: the scene with the trampled snacks.
I wonder, as we end the year 5782 and begin 5783, what we remember when we look back. When someone asks us “How was your year?” what will we answer?
No one’s year was 100 percent wonderful or 100 percent terrible. It’s always a mixed bag. And so much is in the narrative we create for ourselves.
I can look back and tell myself how horrible the past year was. We had Omicron just when we thought we were done with Covid. Inflation and instability continue to plague the country. We had to leave our beautiful, spacious shul on short notice and daven in a tiny preschool classroom for most of the year. My kids fought. I didn’t get enough sleep. Etc.
But if I delve a little deeper, I can think of all the tremendous blessings Hashem bestowed upon this this past year. We celebrated multiple bar mitzvahs and weddings and brissim this year. We had a beautiful hachnasat sefer Torah in our community. Our programs and events are bursting through the seams, and our preschool is fuller than it’s ever been. We just rented a gorgeous, brand new shul and we have so much to look forward to!
So how was the past year? It’s all in what we tell ourselves. Whichever story we weave, that’s what counts.
But one thing is clear: Our Heavenly Father wants only the best for us. And when we delve into the past year and sort through the murkiness, we’ll be able to find the blessings He has showered upon us. We prayed last Rosh Hashanah for a good, healthy, sweet year, and if we haven’t found those blessings, it simply means we haven’t dug deeply enough.
Dig deeper, brush away the dirt, and find the gold. It’s there. That’s what we need to focus on.
In just a few days we will sit together in shul and pray for a healthy, happy, successful year, filled with Hashem’s blessings. May He make those blessings plentiful, and easy for us to recognize!
Shana Tova
Rabbi Uriel Vigler