By Helen Wolff, Rina Friedman, Laurie Adler, and Bonnie Polansky
Think before you deliver! Let us look around this year, and in the years to come, and think before we deliver our mishloach manos. We give packages to our children to hand out to their classmates. But there are a number of children who receive very few packages and some who receive none at all. This might include the special-needs child as well as the child of an observant family who is enrolled in a public school. Consider the child of somebody you know and deliver a package to him or her.
There are children who may be in a new school or perhaps in a new classroom and have had the painful experience of watching as classmates hand out packages to one another but none to him. This happens more often than we would like to think and when it does, it is hurtful to the boy or girl who has been left out. Making certain that this child gets a package will brighten his day immeasurably.
When you drive down the street to make your deliveries, why not stop and deliver a mishloach manos package to a house you had intended to bypass? The family will be delighted to receive it. And you will be delighted that you gave it.
You might want to follow this simple rule: make a list of those you intend to deliver to and then add the names of three to five people you know who are not on your list.
Happy Purim to you and yours!
