USA. A Mexican restaurant. We had not yet ordered anything, and the food was already arriving. Chips. Salsa. Unrequested. Free. I stopped the waiter. "We have not earned these." "They just come with the table, man." They come with the TABLE. In my land, hospitality is a debt. Every gift creates an obligation, weighed carefully, returned in the proper season with interest of feeling. Here, the gift arrives before you have even proven you can pay for dinner. This is not an appetizer. This is a declaration: we trust you. Eat. I ate with the gravity the moment deserved. And then — I must report this calmly — the basket emptied, and a new one appeared. "Did we…?" "Refill," the waiter said. "It's bottomless." Bottomless. They have wells of salsa. The supply lines of this nation are beyond anything my ancestors imagined. My friend warned me. "Don't fill up on chips, dude." Too late. I had accepted three baskets. Honor demanded each one be finished — an unfinished gift is an insult. By the time my actual food arrived, I was a ruined man. I was not hungry. I was not comfortable. I had been defeated by a courtesy. Generosity that arrives before the request cannot be repaid. It can only be survived. I know the rule now. I have made my peace with the basket. One basket. Two at the most. Who am I deceiving. There is no number of baskets I would refuse. The trust of a nation is in that salsa, and I intend to honor all of it.

Pickup confirmed 🏀💙 getting @CharlesOakley34 where he needs to be

7 ideas my grandfather, Moshe (Shtemerman) Sterman of blessed memory, lived with after surviving the Holocaust: 1. First You Eat The Soup -- if you have soup and a potato, you first eat the soup, because if you have to run you can put the potato in your pocket. 2. Always Be On Time -- after the war while smuggling Jewish refugees across an international border, a few minute delay in the group led to his friend getting shot by a border guard. We'll never know his name. 3. Sleep With One Leg Out of the Sheets -- self explanatory. 4. Pick Up on the Little Things -- traversing alone in the forests of Poland/Ukraine for nearly 2 years, he survived on his wit, and keen observation. He would enter gentile homes, quickly scan the walls for photographs or other memorabilia, and present himself as a fortune teller to military wives and others, in return for food. Later in the Red Army he would identify little specks in the sky as friendly or enemy aircraft. 5. The Jews Won't Be Victims Anymore -- he was the only kid in his Yeshiva to jump off the Nazi truck after they were caught in the forest, and as a result he was the only kid to survive. He joined the Polish Partisans. Then the Red Army. And then the Jewish underground in Europe. 6. Speak Your Mind - a gangrene infection from a leg wound forced him to undergo surgery from a Soviet military doctor. Before going under (or downing a bottle of Vodka), he grabbed the doctor by his shirt and said "if I wake up without my leg, I will find you, and I will kill you." He woke up with his leg. 7. No One Owes You Anything - he arrived to the United States with nearly nothing. For years he was a customer peddlar, carrying furniture up countless flights of stairs in Manhattan and Brooklyn. Finally after many years he opened up a women's clothing shop, out of his own basement, my father's childhood home. He refused reparations, pity, and favors, instead deciding to rebuild his life on his own terms, despite all odds. He was the only survivor from his entire extended family. #YomHashoah2025