Grandma phones her daughter and says, "I'm coming to see you in half-an-hour".
When she arrives, her grandson runs to her, cuddles her and gives her a kiss. "Grandma", he says, "we don't need anything".
"What do you mean" Grandma asks.
"When you phoned," says her grandson, "Mummy said, "that's all I need! Now you're here, we don't need anything.
In a lot of families, no matter how many siblings there are, the brunt of taking care of Mom and Dad falls disproportionately on one child.
Last week a reader in Hamodia wrote to rabbi Abraham Twerski about the anger the individual feels that the entire burden of her father's care falls on her while the siblings don't put in their fair share. She wanted advice from the rabbi as to how to deal with the anger that was eating away at her.
The rabbi answered as follows.
"Suppose someone told you of an investment that was certain to increase grealtly in value. You shared this information with your siblings, but they had no interest. You did invest, and the value of your ivestment more than quadrupled. How would you feel toward your siblings? Angry? Probably not. You'd feel sorry for them that they lost this opportunnity.
You have the precious mitzvah of kibud av, for which the Torah promises great reward. Your siblings are not taking advantage of it? You should feel sorry for them, and when you pity someone, you can't really be angry at him."
Something to think about, n'est ce pas?
No comments:
Post a Comment