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There is something special about sitting on the lap of a grandparent. It’s even more special when that grandparent begins to rub or scratch your back.

I have had the z’chus to be a rebbe and guidance counselor in a few wonderful yeshivos during my career in chinuch. One of my talmidim, Yossi Glanz, was a student in my shiur when I was a seventh grade rebbe in Ashar and then again when I was one of his tenth grade rebbeim in Heichal HaTorah. I had, and have, a close connection with Yossi.

It’s fascinating how something can be so exciting for one person and so anxiety-provoking and upsetting to another person.

At the beginning of Sh’moneh Esrei, we praise Hashem as “gomeil chasadim tovim – grants good kindness.”

It seems like strange vernacular. Is there kindness that isn’t good?

Mr. Yossi Grunwald, a friend of my father, related to me a powerful personal story.

In celebration of her bas mitzvah last week, my daughter Chayala and I went on a father-daughter outing. No, we didn’t go to Eretz Yisrael, LA, or Miami. Far more exciting than that, we went to visit the land of my youth: Manhattan’s Lower East Side. For me it was a walk down memory lane; for Chayala it was a glimpse into a strange and unfamiliar world.

In the introduction to his book, The Gates of the Forest, Elie Wiesel wrote that “G-d created the world because He loves stories.”