D'vorahDavida
Yetzirah

  There are moments in life when you have to acknowledge there is a higher power. I don't care what kind of atheist or agnostic you think you are. In a few days it will be Passover. Last year was the first year that I ever made a Pesach Seder myself. I have attended many, but never led one myself. It was a rousing success and my dearest friends were there to help me celebrate it. A lot of difficult things have been going on just lately in our family, and the strain of it has been so overwhelming that the thought of making a seder seemed impossible to me. Then I listened to a class by my Rabbi and I knew I needed to do it, no matter what. But there was this one detail that was adding to my distress. Ever since last year, I have been searching for a certain wine we used. Everyone was overjoyed by it. We declared it the perfect wine for such an occasion. And for someone like myself, who doesn't drink wine on a regular basis, to be able to have such a delightful treat to add to the enjoyment and the mitzvah of making Pesach.... well, it became a THING that was necessary. It just would NOT be a proper Pesach without it. So in all my various travels during the year, I began searching for it. I spoke to two managers in two different Trader Joe's stores [where I found it last year], I beseeched two different wine managers in Raley's. I went on line to find on one website that I could not possibly afford the shipping, and at others where this particular wine was sold out. Which doesn't surprise me in the least. It's ambrosia. I had given up hope. Just as an aside here... don't do that. Don't ever do that. As a matter of fact Rabbi Nachman of Breslov said, "Never despair. Never! It is forbidden to give up hope!" Thursdays, my little circle of friends and I get together and learn Torah. S. arrived first. She came into the kitchen with a bag in her arms. When she handed it to me I knew. She had found our wine. Right in our neck of the woods in a store that I never even knew existed. She said when she asked the man about it, he said he only carried about ten kinds of wine... but that he actually had that one! Can you imagine? Our wine! She got the enormous blessing of being able to be part of the miracles of Passover. I can't stop looking at them and fondling the frosted bottles and marveling at how the Holy One sees to it that when we want to do a mitzvah, even when we are weary and discouraged, that He sends us a message... in this case... in a bottle, that He knows. He sees. Now we are ready to make a proper seder. With Joy.