07/14/2025
When I got up to the 18th floor of NYU Cancer Center, my husband, Yossi, was in a heated conversation with the staff because a Jewish couple had just been there with their baby—but due to a hospital policy that prohibits children on that floor, the father was forced to leave with the baby, while his wife, visibly upset, went into her appointment alone.
Yossi and I both knew what I had to do.
I headed back down to the lobby, and it didn’t take long to spot him—long peyos, a heavy black coat, pacing with a stroller. I walked over and said, with confidence, “I’m a mother and a bubby. I can watch your baby. Go back upstairs to your wife.”
He looked stunned. “But doesn’t your husband need you?”
“He’s the one who sent me,” I said. “Go.”
He thanked me and headed for the elevator. Then, almost as an afterthought, he turned back and said, “We should exchange numbers.” We did—and then he took off at a run.
The next stretch of time I spent with a beautiful, smiley baby who loved the songs I sang. I still don’t know the baby’s name, age, or even gender.
When the father returned, he said, with emotion, “Baruch Hashem—I got upstairs just as the doctor walked in. My wife wasn’t alone. Sometimes Hashem sends an angel in human clothing.”
The gift that this father gave me—his trust—is so much bigger and more powerful than the half hour I gave him. He believed that just by being a Jew, a member of the same nation as he, I would watch and protect his baby like my own. And his trust energized and comforted me.
We each have our own role to play in this complex and impossible-to-understand world; nothing is by accident—we are all exactly where we are meant to be—and our connection to one another is strong, even supernatural. And undoubtedly, as I saw on that day, we can relax, because Hashem, clearly, has a master plan.
Note: This glass Home Blessing carries a timeless message—peace, love, and good health.
