Dollar For Your Thoughts

Dollar For Your Thoughts Last week, we sent out 320 JFX Chanukah gift bags for our virtual Chanukah party. Halfway through the assembly line we realized that we hadn't ordered enough birthday party hats for the party, and we needed to run out and buy some more. My first trip was to the dollar store at Cedar Center. They only had mini-hats, 150 in total (enough for 75 bags), so I filled up the entire bottom of my shopping cart with them, and went to wait on a very long line full of holiday shoppers. The line was so long that I felt bad for the woman just in front of me. She didn't have a shopping cart and was struggling to juggle all of her green and red holiday tinsel and decorations. Judging from the length of the line and the slow pace that it was moving along, I realized that she'd be juggling her holiday wares for a while and I offered to put her things in my shopping cart. The bottom of the cart was full of party hats, but the upper deck, the part with the area to fit a sitting child, was available. In my humble opinion, this was quite a generous favor. After all, being that my beard is neither long enough nor white enough to pass for a Santa, I must have left some fellow shoppers scratching their heads. Plus, the yarmulke on my head probably added to the confusion. Just what is this rabinic- looking gentleman doing with a shopping cart filled with green and red tinsel?? Keep 'em guessing! Ho ho ho! She gave me a subtle nod and dumped her items into my cart. While waiting in line, I impulsively grabbed a few 3-liter bottles of soda (yes, I knew my family wouldn't necessarily appreciate pouring soda out of a 3-liter bottle at the Shabbat dinner table, but I couldn't resist the price!). Now, being that my shopping cart was already full, I ended up holding and juggling the extra soda bottles, and I couldn't help thinking, Does this lady appreciate what I'm doing for her? She really owes me a big time thank you. She minded her own business for the next 15 minutes until we finally reached the checkout counter, then promptly and wordlessly took her items from the front of the cart, had them scanned, paid, and left. I was shocked that she didn't even bother to say thank you. She literally took her bags and walked out of the store. She didn't even bother turning around to nod goodbye. Where was her basic human trait of gratitude? Perhaps God was putting this woman into my life two days before our campaign to teach me a message about hakarat hatov, gratitude. Perhaps God wanted me to feel viscerally how important gratitude is and how we can't take people's gratitude for granted. From the time our children are younger, we teach them about the importance of saying thank you. We prompt them by saying things like, “what do you say to the nice man?” or “What’s the magic word?” It’s a long process, but we hope that eventually we hammer the gratitude trait into their little brains, and help them become more grateful people as they get older. Judaism teaches that we wake up every morning and must express our gratitude with the words “modeh ani” -- “I am grateful to God for the opportunity of a new day.” The Hebrew phrase “modeh ani” also means “I admit.” This is no coincidence. Perhaps the reason that it is often so hard for us to say “thank you” is because thanking someone means admitting that we were vulnerable and needed their help. It is an admission that we are human, we are not self-sufficient, and we need others’ help to make it through the day. So in truth, a sincere thank you is an act of humility, and that is not always an easy thing to do. Why did I need this message right before our campaign? JFX is truly fortunate to be a small and wonderful community. We all try to be there for each other and we all recognize that we need each other to survive and to thrive. Ruchi and I were truly humbled and filled with gratitude for the hundreds of people who supported us, enabling us to achieve and even exceed our fundraising goals, and enabling us to do what we do to bring inspired Judaism to all of you. All the way from our lead donors, to a $3 donation that was given to us with sincerity and love: even in these challenging times, we did this together. Thank you, thank you, thank you! The funny thing is that we actually forgot to wear the birthday hats at virtual livestream!! Yet another priceless opportunity for humility: we all mess up, and we're only human. Shabbat Shalom, Rabbi Koval