Mr. Ziman, a maintenance tech at Ner Israel Rabbinical College, is fondly known as Mr. Benyamin. “Everybody loves him,” says Rabbi Yair Friedman, my son-in-law who grew up on Yeshiva Lane. “Mr. Benyamin has a wonderful attitude. His professional skills and cheerful demeanor make him a much loved member of the Ner Israel family He comes to all of the Yeshiva Lane families’ simchas. I still remember the magic tricks that he performed at my wedding!” 

Benyamin and his wife Bonnie have been married for 32 years and have three lovely children. Unfortunately, Bonnie has not been well for many years. Her longtime friend Suri Lager remembers Bonnie from her healthy days. “Bonnie always greeted everyone with a smile, and had a great sense of fashion. She cut hair from home for women and girls in the community. I remember her as being an active participant in all the shul’s activities. She helped decorate the shul for the Purim festivities. Often, she brought my daughters along to the pool with her girls. “Rebbetzin Mindi Hauer recalls, “The Ziman family, including Bonnie, has a special zest for life and the ability to live in the moment.”

As a newly-minted resident physician in New York during the late 1980s, I first learned from afar about a certain distinguished neurosurgeon from Baltimore named Benjamin Solomon Carson. Although medical journal articles are the traditional way for most medical doctors to get the latest news about breakthroughs and advances in the field, I became acquainted with Dr. Carson’s early contributions to medicine and humanity during a morning ritual known to all doctors as “morning rounds.”

There I was, on morning bedside rounds during a pediatric rehabilitation residency-training rotation at Albert Einstein-Kennedy Institute Hospital, when my supervising attending physician boldly announced that medical history had been dramatically made. A pair of twins joined at the head (“conjoined twins”) had been masterfully separated by a pioneering Johns Hopkins physician after a 22-hour grueling and history-making surgical procedure.

Mrs. Miriam Rosen (nee Kaufman) lived in Baltimore and Washington area for over 68 years and touched the lives of so many people. She lived a beautiful and meaningful life as a wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and teacher. She was full of love and smiles for all who knew her, to the point where you’d never know what she’d lived through during the Holocaust.

Mrs. Rosen’s early childhood years in the shtetl left her with lasting traditions, a delicious Yiddish wit, and an emunah peshutah, simple faith. A few stories of her life follow.

Mrs. Rosen was born in 1924 in a small shtetl called Sarnik, near Pinsk, in what was then Poland, to Reb Herschel and Mrs. Bayla Kaufman. She was the youngest of seven children. When she was a young teen, her mother passed away, and she was raised in what she recalled as a warm, loving home by her father and older siblings.

February is Jewish Disability Awareness and Inclusion Month. In recognition of this special month, I spoke to several members of our community who have Down syndrome or who are the parents of children with Down syndrome. We discussed how they or their children are included in the community at home, at work, and at school, gaining greater perspective on the lives they live.

Elisheva Katz

Elisheva Katz is 25 years old. She attended Bais Yaakov starting from elementary school until she completed high school when she was 21. Now she works at Levindale and at the JCC preschool. I spoke to Elisheva to find out what it’s like to be a person with a disability.

There are many aspects of life in Eretz Yisrael that I love, but I do miss being near my family. Sometimes we are so busy with our everyday life that it is a back-burner issue. Other times it comes more to the forefront, like the Friday afternoon hustle and bustle on our block as numerous families pack up children and strollers to travel to Bubby Bnei Brak or Savta Yerushalayim for Shabbos. Yamim Tovim are a flurry of families coming and going, and Chanukah means eight days of family parties all over the country. Not for us! We can commiserate with our children who feel so left out, but we can’t make it up to them.

Inclusion. It’s the “in” thing to do. It’s politically correct and it teaches “important life lessons.” But what is inclusion? Who are we including? Where? And how?

When you hear the word disability, what comes to mind? Different? Physical challenges? Intellectual disabilities? What about more hidden conditions like social difficulties, behavioral challenges, or mental illness?

Actor Edward Barbanell, an actor with Down Syndrome, said, “Don’t call us people with disabilities. We have DIFF-abilities.”

As I exit the bus, I notice the prominent white Gesher Hameitarim, Jerusalem’s Chords Bridge looming ahead. The bridge’s structure was designed to resemble a harp, its inspiration taken from the pasuk in Tehilim, “Praise Him with harp and lyre.” A light rail train passes swiftly across the bridge and over Sderot Herzl toward the hustle-and-bustle of the central bus station at the City’s entrance. I am greeted at the station by Baltimoreans Rabbi Shimon and Miriam Apisdorf. They lead me along a narrow path, the back route to their cozy apartment on a quiet, tree-lined street of Kiryat Moshe.

One of a few garden neighborhoods established in the 1920s, Kiryat Moshe’s residents today are mainly Israeli with a small number of American and French families. It has a large dati leumi community, a small chareidi community, and a “secular” population as well – although the Apisdorfs will tell you that what is called secular in Israel has a totally different meaning than it does in the States.

It is no secret that college costs money – lots of it. However, many students are able to go because they receive financial aid from both the federal and state government. The starting point for all these sources of aid is a form called FAFSA, Free Application for Federal Student Aid.  Bear in mind that many yeshivas and seminaries are legal colleges, so their students qualify.

Some parents think the FAFSA does not apply to them, because they believe their income is too high. This is a mistake, because, even if you do not qualify for government aid, you might be eligible for aid from the college itself, and they use the FAFSA when granting it. Furthermore, according to a recent article by Wall Street Journal, even wealthy students should file the FAFSA. They offered several reasons. First, you might sometimes get aid even if you think you earn too much. Second, by filing the form and getting turned down, the college realizes that you can afford full tuition. Since they need some students who can pay, that might give you an edge on admission!

Do we now live in a high-crime area? This is the perception many people are getting after a string of daytime and nighttime burglaries and hold-ups have plagued our neighborhoods. Not only were valuable possessions lost, all of us, and in particular the victims of the break-ins and muggings, are left feeling vulnerable and violated.

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Michelle and Alan* are still traumatized after what they found following their return home from a mini-vacation. Their door had been kicked in and was ajar. “I was in total shock, and we are still pretty traumatized by it,” Michelle said. They found the door kicked in and the house ransacked, with many things taken. There had been no cars in their driveway for 24 hours, but they usually have their house alarm on. On that day, it seems the babysitter may not have set the alarm correctly when leaving to take the kids to school. Their home was one of several in their neighborhood that have been broken into within a few short weeks.

The fireworks were on display in full force at the first Republican debate of the 2016 primary season in Charleston, South Carolina, on January 14. I was privileged to be in the debate hall and later in the “spin room.” After going through airport-style security directed by the secret service, I, along with crowds of other people with tickets in hand, entered the North Charleston Coliseum Performing Arts Center and excitedly awaited the start of the debate. At around 8:50 p.m., RNC Chairman Reince Preibus took to the stage and poured enthusiasm into the packed house. Before announcing the moderators, he passionately proclaimed, “We are the party that is diverse. The other side is boring, old, and stale.” He then assured the audience that the RNC is committed to whoever is the Republican nominee, putting to rest any speculation that the RNC would not back Donald Trump should he become the nominee of the party.