Double Blessings

Double Blessings

My sister called me Erev Pesach, nine months before I conceived my beautiful, youngest daughter (see the story Mikvah On Time).

Anxiously, she told me she had a big problem. “I have to go to mikvah the first seder! How am I supposed to do that?  We have to go to Ima’s house, a house filled with guests! They will all see me with no makeup! An hour’s walk! How can I do it? Can I not wait and go Chol Hamoed?” she asked me, silently pleading for my approval and agreement. However, true to my own strong conviction that mikvah immersion should not be delayed, I told her she must do it, she must immerse on time. She demurred saying she cannot, but I was insistent and at last she agreed.

It was still quite cold on the first night of Pesach, but she bravely walked an hour to the mikvah. When she arrived, imagine her dismay when the attendant told her that the boiler had just broken and there was no hot water at all! The mikvah itself was icy cold!

Very discouraged she sat down to rest a minute, catch her breath and try to warm up a bit from the cold walk. As she was resting, another woman walked in, hair not covered, wearing slacks, ready to use the mikvah. She, too, was told that there was absolutely no hot water.

“No matter,” said the lady. “It is my time to immerse and I will go, hot water or no hot water!” Turning to my sister, she said: “And you are coming too!”

Her enthusiasm was contagious. My sister immersed and emerged blue, from the freezing water. She made her way back home in the cold night, coming to the Seder, with no makeup and a table filled with guests.

She conceived that night.

Nine months later, as she lay in the hospital, nursing her new baby girl, she caught a glimpse of movement from the corner of her eye. Looking up, she realized that it was the very same lady who had gone to the mikvah that night with her, is walking past her room, pushing a bassinette! My sister called out to her, “Do you remember me?” “Of course, I remember you!” she replied. “Mazel Tov!” my sister said, “I had a baby girl, what did you have?”

Turning to my sister, she smiled and said, “Twin girls!” My sister realized, this special woman had been blessed with double blessings! One bracha for her own mitzvah and one bracha for the part she played in my sister's mitzvah!

When you do your mitzvos b'simcha, wholeheartedly, you may not always immediately see the blessings that result. However, the blessing is there nonetheless, and will be revealed when the time is right.


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