This week I found myself dealing with multiple doctors for multiple kids. At this point in life, having raised children in the city for so many years, I know how to navigate the system. I’m quite familiar with all the emergency room protocols and I know exactly which ones to avoid.
First up, was my son. Late Saturday night, just as I was drifting off to sleep, I heard my wife answer the phone. It was our teenage son, who was away for a weekend Shabbaton. They had been riding golf carts, and his was being driven a bit too fast. The driver made a sharp turn and my son fell out and sustained some cuts and bruises. Luckily, there was a hatzalah member nearby, who was able to take care of him until he came home.
The next day I took him to the emergency room where an x-ray revealed that he had broken his tibia—quite a serious injury that will necessitate him being in a cast for 6 weeks. That means 6 weeks of no basketball, no swimming, no volleyball, no hiking and no running—not a great position for a teenage boy heading into summer.
The second incident involved my 5-year-old son who came down with a rash that spread across his body quite rapidly. I knew he needed to be examined by a doctor, and it turned out he had most likely come into contact with poison ivy somewhere. Thank G-d, nothing that a little TLC at home won’t take care of.
Then my 9-year-old daughter came home complaining of pain in her fingers, and it turns out that she had sprained her fingers playing ball with her friends in school. Nothing serious, just uncomfortable.
But all this in one week? What’s going on? Nothing, and I mean nothing, in our lives is random. Everything is Divinely orchestrated by our loving Father.
When incidents like these happen to us, it is G-d’s way of communicating. He cannot Whatsapp me, He cannot Facebook message me, He cannot pick up the phone to call me, so He talks to me in this way. First He tried to get my attention via the incident with the golf cart, but alas, I guess I did not get the message. Then He tried again with the rash, but still no response from me. So now incident number three with my daughters fingers … OK, G-d, I’m listening now, you got my attention!
Exactly what He is trying to say is hard for me to know, but I do know that in these types of situations the Rebbe would tell us to check our mezuzahs and tefillin. It’s not enough to have them; they can deteriorate over time and need to be checked regularly to make sure they are still kosher. The Rebbe also always told us to give some charity. So that’s where I’ll be starting.
How about you? Are you listening when G-d speaks to you? Maybe He wanted me to write this article to inspire you to do a mitzvah, too.