Hey G-d I'm down here! See me?

There has been a lot going on lately for our family. My husband finished up the school year a huge achievement for our whole family. Now though as he enters the final stretch of engineering school and is looking for an internship and a job a lot is up in the air we aren't sure what the next step is or where it will lead. This kind of thing is so hard for me I need a plan I need to know what's coming next. To be honest this is when faith gets hard for me. Is there really a plan? Does G-d really see us down here?

So today was a really normal day just before dinner I ran out to run some errands. I needed to run to Whole Foods and I had pick up some leftover couscous from a BBQ we had at our synagogue last Sunday from our Rabbi's wife at their house. I was running behind as always. Isn't that the way it is for most of us? Always behind never anywhere on time or at least it seems that way. I had said I'd be by at 5:30 for the leftovers well at 5:50 I went sprinting up to the door. She came to the door and said "Oh I'm so sorry the leftovers aren't here they are at Chabad I am so sorry I wasn't clear about that". For those of you who don't know we live just around the corner from Chabad so I could have picked up the leftovers on my way to Whole Foods if I'd known they were there. This was no big deal I just stopped by on my way home instead. As I pulled out from the Chabad to head home couscous in the passenger seat an elderly lady flagged me down from her car. She was so upset I was really worried she was having a health problem and needed an ambulance or something. I rolled down my window and said "Yes ma’am! Do you need some help?" She frantically told me she had been lost for nearly and hour and desperately needed help to find her way. She asked me if I could help her to find the street she was looking for. She said she had asked several people and no one knew the street. I said I'd do my best. I asked her what street she was looking for? She said, "It's called Golden Oak do you know it?" I smiled and said "Yes ma’am, I know it follow me I'll take you there.”

After I led her to Golden Oak I turned around to head home back up the street as I passed her car she rolled her window down and said "Thank you so much I don't know if I would have ever found my way without your help" "No problem ma’am, no problem at all" I said.  What she didn't realize was I knew where Golden Oak was because it was the street I grew up on and that I just happened to be there to help her at that time because I was running behind and went to the "wrong" place first. You see I was supposed to be there for her in that place at that time. She felt lost and I felt behind and silly for going to the wrong place first. G-d knew right where we both were and that we needed each other’s help. She needed me to find her way and I needed to be there to help her so G-d could remind me that he orchestrates all my steps.

Even though I don't know what G-d has planned next for our family or where we will be I have stopped worrying about it because G-d hasn't lost track off us He knows right where we are and has a great plan for what's next. 

Two Gardens: trying to understand death and devastation

"My beloved has gone down to his garden, To the beds of balsam, To pasture his flock in the gardens And gather lilies."

Song of Solomon 6:2 

Last Sunday I came home and said to Yosef we need to be ready when the tornado sirens go off it will be soon. When you have lived in tornado alley most your life you just know when they're coming. The air gets warm, heavy and still and the sky grows dark and angry. Moments after I said this the siren wailed I took Abby to shelter with me in our tub and tried to distract her with a cartoon on the iPad. I prayed the prayer I have prayed since I was 9 every time the sirens blared please G-d not us, not anyone this time.  The sirens stopped in our area about 15 minutes later. We sat glued to the news hearing the first of the reports. This time it was bad, it was really bad.

This time it had hit hard in very populated areas. People had taken shelter but it didn't matter. Houses and whole neighborhoods were gone. Right after it happened it was still dark and we all hoped when the sun came up it would be a bit better. There would be damage we knew that but we prayed no lives were taken. But lives were lost, 15 in all taken by the storm.  Each name each face was heartbreaking but it was the 4 children that stuck with me the most and left be brokenhearted  Two girls and two boys both sets siblings. I got busy fast doing what little I could to try to help. Yosef and I gathered donations as much as we could as fast as we could. When I took the donations up to my sister for her to distribute I saw for myself the severe damage the tornado caused. The tornado's clear cut destructive path so apparent. The site shook me to my core. 

You see I believe in a powerful G-d a G-d that never loses or relinquishes control. A G-d with plans for each of the lives he creates. It infuriated me! How could G-d could let this happen? I was still so sad so angry especially over the children taken by the storm when I went to Shabbat services on Saturday. I waited for the Rabbi after services finished. I waited for the children to leave the room and asked the question I had pondered heartbroken all week. Why the children? 

The Rabbi's answer was in the form of a story. A story about two very different gardens and the gardener who cares lovingly for both . There are two gardens he explained our's here on earth and G-d's. Our garden which G-d created was once perfect like His but now has so many ugly things. Our garden has violence, sadness and death. All things that damage the gardener's beloved flowers in our garden. G-d's garden has none of these things. G-d's garden is perfect. It says in Song of Solomon that our Beloved comes to our garden and gathers His lilies. That he offered is what happened last Sunday our beloved, our G-d came in a storm to gather some of his most prized lilies. Some of the most perfect flowers in our garden. As heart wrenching and unbelievably sad it is for those left behind in our garden without those perfect lilies the lilies are fine. They are in G-d's garden.

My heart is still broken for the families and friends who lost loved ones and those who lost homes and businesses. I can not even begin to imagine how they are going on with their lives after such a  horrific loss. I am however no longer worried or angry for the children taken by the storm because I believe at this very moment they are enjoying G-d's perfect garden.