Everyone has a weakness. 

Some of us have more than one. 

I will admit to chocolate, pina coladas, jewelry and ... shoes. 

I somehow can always find the need for just one more  pair. 

Of course I don’t have an Imelda Marcos type obsession, not at all. But an extra pair here or there can never hurt. 

Last week I read a story about a pair of shoes which gave a much deeper meaning to this important accessory. 

Rabbi Paysach Krohn, contemporary story teller,shared an amazing vignette. 

This past September he took the opportunity to visit an aunt who lived in Israel. She had survived a terrorist attack years ago. In 2001 there was a bombing in a pizzeria in Jerusalem. (A young woman I personally knew, died in that attack. She was pregnant with her first child!) Rabbi Krohn’s aunt was climbing the steps to the second level of the pizza shop when the bomb detonated. The blast was so powerful it knocked off her shoes. Her daughter, who was with her, tried to help her leave the scene. But there was broken glass everywhere and she had no shoes. The Aunt hesitated and in a moment  of superhuman strength, her daughter lifted her and carried her across the street. As they stood outside,  opposite the smoldering destruction of what had once been Sbarro’s pizza shop, a man approached them with a pair of shoes in hand.  He was the owner of a shoe shop down the street and he wanted to give her a pair of shoes to protect her feet from the shards of glass underfoot. The mother and daughter left the area shortly thereafter, two people who were blessed to walk away unscathed, and able to walk out on their own two feet. 

The aunt told Rabbi Krohn that since that time, whenever life was full of travails and she just felt she couldn’t handle those challenges or she felt she really didn’t  deserve the test she was facing, she would go to her closet and don those shoes. She would put them on to remind herself of the kindness she had experienced. 

The shoes served for her as a talisman that whatever was coming her way she needed to change her focus and pay attention to the gifts within the picture. In this case to recognize she had been gifted the greatest gift of all, the gift of life. 

This weeks Torah portion is called Vayechi, which means, and he lived, referring to our patriarch Jacob and his life. 

But interestingly enough it doesn’t talk about Jacob’s life at all. The portion speaks about how Jacob died. 

It reveals the blessings Jacob bestowed on children and grandchildren at the end of his days, it talks about where he wished to be buried (back in the land of Israel, not in Egypt) and it is a testimony to a life well lived, with all his children following in his path. 

So why is it called VaYechi, and he lived? It should be called And he Died?

The Lubavitcher Rebbe teaches us that one  can only truly assess the righteousness of a person immediately before his death. A great person may die a failure. Now as we wrap up the story of Jacob’s life we see how the challenges he faced and overcame helped him to complete his mission in the world. 

At the end a persons life there is generally a tombstone placed upon a grave. On that marker we engrave the years lived by the person who is interred, 

1891-1976 for example. And between those significant dates is a little dash. 

That dash is our life. 

How do you live your dash?

Do we use the challenges we face as stepping stones to greater self awareness and character development?

Do we see the experiences and realize how they shape us? 

Do we see the gifts and find ways to keep those as our guideposts even during the difficult moments?

Our Sages teach us that the money the brothers got from the sale of Joseph was used for the purchase of some shoes. 

It is a symbol of a family torn apart, an outrageous act done for a paltry prize. Those shoes were a symbol of those who had lost their way. 

Now at the end of Jacob’s life the family has reconciled. His sons stand together about his bed as his life is ebbing away. All of the family now recognize the gifts of the Divinely inspired plan which has brought them to this point. There is no bitterness amongst them as they see themselves through the prism of Jacob’s life, as the next chapter on the path of the Divinely ordained Plan. 

We walk many miles in our shoes. Whether those shoes be designer or utilitarian, high heeled or flats, what matters is where we have them take us. 

May we merit to walk on the road of life with our eyes wide open to the blessings we receive and focused on the goal of taking the next step towards a meaningful, well lived life. In an awesome pair of shoes of course!

Shabbat Shalom and lots of love!