Why I Steal
I have a confession to make. I steal. Not every day. But often enough that I have become rather good at it. I steal when no one is looking. I steal when the world is distracted. I steal when obligations line up outside my door…
Essays
Some thoughts become books.
Others are meant to meet us exactly where we are.
These essays explore faith, kindness, gratitude, purpose, suffering, marriage, leadership, and the quiet moments through which Hashem gently shapes a human life.
Whether read in five minutes or remembered for a lifetime, each reflection is written with one purpose:
To help us see more clearly.
Selected Essays
10 essays to explore
The Parrot in the Holy Temple
The parrot knew the entire Bible by heart. A few weeks later, it was dinner. The mother was turning one hundred. Her three sons wanted to give her the party of the century—and each wanted to find a gift worthy of the occasion.…
What Friendship Is For
I spent years looking for someone who did not exist. At least, not in the form I imagined. I wasn't looking for someone to agree with me, admire me, or simply enjoy my company. I wanted something far rarer: someone who could see…
My Pinocchio
Geppetto had a piece of wood. He wanted a son. So he began to carve. Eyes. A mouth. Arms. Legs. Little by little, a boy appeared beneath his hands. But the little figure could do nothing by himself. Every movement still depended…
Enter My Room
Please enter quietly. We have six steps to go together. Take the chair beside the bed. Stay with me for a little while. Ninth floor. Memorial Sloan Kettering. A hospital bed sits in the middle of the room. Beside it stands an IV…
My Meeting with a Sorcerer
When I was fifteen years old, a woman tried to tell me my future. She couldn't. I never asked her why. During the entire encounter, I do not remember saying a single word. But before it was over, she moved her chair away from me…
Walking Toward the Tsunami
The sea disappears. You look toward the horizon. Then it comes back. A tsunami. A towering wall of water rises on the horizon, higher than the buildings, stretching as far as your eyes can see, moving toward you with terrifying…
The Cemetery of the Living
The towel is wet in my hands. I bend over my son’s grave and wipe the stone slowly. Not quickly. Not as a chore. I dip the cloth into the bucket, squeeze out the water, and pass it carefully over the letters of his name. There is…
Elon Musk’s Penny
There is a penny Elon Musk cannot buy. That sounds ridiculous. A fortune of roughly a trillion dollars could, at least on paper, buy more than four hundred thousand homes worth $2.5 million each. Spend a billion dollars a year,…
My Home in Exile
For eighteen years, every key in my pocket has belonged to someone else. Recently, on one of my daily walks, I looked up at the sky. I do that often. Looking upward restores proportion. Buildings become smaller. Errands become…
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