Supplementary Stories

These stories demonstrate point I was trying to make in my last post, but they didn't fit in, so I'm posting them separately.

A few years ago, on Sukkos, me Momma was so taken with the bounty she was preparing that she couldn't resist sharing it with someone. So she called a local tzedaka organization, and asked if there was anyone they knew who needed a place for Yom Tov. They suggested a woman who had just given birth two weeks previously, and was escaping an abusive relationship.
We made plans to accomodate her. About ten minutes before Yom Tov,(the woman still had not arrived) someone who knew her called to tell us, just so as to save us from any embarrassing situations, that the abusive relationship she was escaping was with a non-jew.
Shortly before sunset, after we had already lit candles, the girl arrived. At that point it became apparent that she wasn't escaping anything, as it was her Latino boyfriend who dropped her off.
Over Yom Tov, she went to Shul for every minyan possible, despite the fact that she had obviously not recovered from the birth of her baby. (Her baby's name was Elisheva Maria). She even lectured us a bit on the importance of davening. By the time Pablo came to pick her up, even the small children in my family had pieced together her story.

My parents had been worried that if they found out, it would be eye opening to my innocent siblings, and not in a good way. But the final outcome is, that my sister will never, ever, as long as she lives, become pregnant with a teenage mexican boy.

Here's a story that I do not like, as it doesn't fit in with my thesis.

A man once came to the Brisker Rav, and proclaimed his intentions to visit the Kotel every day, and thereby, according to some, have a mitzva min hatorah of the four species throughout the seven days of Yom Tov. The Brisker Rav asked, "Are you so sure of the kashrus of your lulav and esrog that you are willing to be subject to a mitzva min hatorah?"

The story does fit very well with the Brisker tendency of pessimism.