For a long time I’ve wanted to get a car that could fit my whole sound system, without my having to squeeze things in. I work with sound, and evening after evening, and sometimes during the morning, I travel the city with microphones and speakers, poles and electrical wires, the mixer and recording machine, and all sorts of other expensive equipment. And so, as I said, long ago I came to the conclusion that I needed to switch my car and buy a van, which is suitable for the transport of this expensive heavy equipment. And finally, after many tiring investigations and after spending a significant sum of money, I bought the long-awaited van.
During those exciting moments, when the purchase was finally completed, I accepted upon myself that this van would not begin working for my parnassah before first doing something for Hashem yisbarach. I decided to inaugurate the van with an act of chessed. The first time it drove down the streets, it would be in order to help another Yid!
I saw this as a segulah for success, and I invested a lot of effort to make it happen. I advertised, and I was sure people would come running. I thought that some chessed organization would take up my offer and make use of my van to distribute food. I am constantly hearing about people who need items taken from one place to another, and they would certainly be glad to save the cost of transport. But one day passed and then another, the car stood in the parking lot near my house, and no one called to take me up on my offer...
I was in a quandary. On my end, the van was not inaugurated, and I could not travel in it. I had an event scheduled for the beginning of the following week, and I had planned on using the new van to transport the sound system, but I still hadn’t found a Yid for whom I could do a chessed.
It was already Thursday, and I was truly feeling pressured. What would be? I needed a chessed trip! I sat in the driver’s seat of the van, and I davened to Hashem to send me a good Yid whom I would be able to help. It was seven o’clock in the evening. Suddenly, knocking on the window was a Yid who had left the nearby kollel, and here he was, asking me, “I see that this is a good van to transport things. Are you willing to be our moving truck, for 300 shekels?”
If not for the low roof of the van, and if not for the fact that I am not so young, I would have jumped up in joy. “Yes, yes, for sure,” I said to that avreich. “Where do you need to go?”
He gave me his address and told me that he needed to move to another apartment, and for the past week he’d been searching for someone to move his things. “I can’t pay more than 300 shekels,” he apologized; but I was already up to the next stage.
“I’ll go right over to your address. Do me a favor and call a few people to shlepp everything down and tie it onto the roof well.”
