Nice!

My Zeidy a"h. Areyeh Leib ben Baruch Bendit / Leo Ogorek

I remember once when I was in a certain yeshiva, back in the days when part of the yeshiva experience was still the bad food, I was talking to my Babby and complaining about the fish for lunch that seemed to still be alive, it was also before sushi was popular and my Babby said "When your grandfather was in yeshiva, they didn't get any food, they had to go knocking on peoples doors asking for handouts, and once a week for Shabbos they would get some chicken." I never heard my Zeidy complain about that. Then the holocaust, losing his whole family etc. I never heard my Zeidy complain, sit around and kvetch about that. Then off to America with $20 in their pockets $10 for a chair for my Zeidy b/c he couldnt stand, and as Babby likes to say shes still waiting for the change. Still no complaints, working hard 12 + hrs a day, no complaints, getting robbed in the bakery, at home, no complaints. The one constant was the shtieging. Always learning, always with a dvar Torah. The letters he would send me were filled with divrei Torah. And all I do is complain, about my job, about the car I don't have, about how I need a better bike and on and on. It hit me about a month and a half ago when I was on a trip to all different kivrei Tzadikim in the Ukraine, after a few days I stopped myself and said what am I complaining about I can just imagine all of the people that have been in all of these places that really had what to daven for I should stop complaining. I have it good. Not in the zchus of anything that I have done, who am I but a spoiled child of the 21st century. The reason I have it so good B"H is because of the stock that I come from because my grandparents worked so hard, because my grandparents didnt complain, because my Zeidy learned so shtark, so much. I thank you for that Zeidy. I know you always got nachas from whatever little that I would do, and from my children even more so and I hope that you continue  to get nachas from us. I just want to end off with something that I said by my Saba A"H Shmuel Shmelke Gross's shloshim which I think applies to my Zeidy as well. The ninth of Reb Nachmans 13 famous stories is the story of The Sophisticate and the Simpleton, the Chacham and the Tam. It's about 2 friends who grow up together and eventualy went on their own ways one to become a worldly, educated, etc. guy, and his friend a simple shoemaker  Long story short the simpleton ends up 2nd to the king and the sophisticate ends up with nothing chased by the law. Simple doesn't mean stupid ,far from it. Both my grandfathers in their own ways were true examples of the Tam the simple men who make the world keep going. I just hope that I could learn to be more simple, not complain so much, teach that to my children and give my Zeidy what to smile about while he's shteiging away in the big yeshiva up their. I know that he is in good company, with his family, with his old friends, with his rosh yeshiva and that puts a smile on my face. Babby, Abba, Aunt Elky, Uncles Ushy and Benny, may you be strong, knowing that Zeidy suffers no more and may you all be cosoled among all of the mourners of our nation and may we only know Simcha. Please Hashem send us the Mashiach so we can be together with Zeidy soon.