Here is video that my uncle Ira took in 1982. It’s nothing you need to see. It shows me eating lunch with my cousin Josh. My sister and cousin Leslie are in the video. As are my father, mother, and Aunt Linda.
https://youtu.be/Y7l-aACIIwY
I don’t remember any of this. I don’t remember the shirt I was wearing. I don’t remember the lunch. I don’t remember any of it. It was a random summer day in 1982. Nothing particular occurred.
And, that is my point.
What I do remember very well is a story that my father told me. He told me that he took to Europe when he was a youth. He told me that he travelled there with a friend, whose name he could not longer remember. He told me that every day, his friend would sleep in, hung-over from festivities and having fun the night before. My father, on the other hand, well rested from turning in early, would go assiduously to the museums and other locations that tourists were supposed to see.
The punch line to my father’s cautionary tale was this: “Brian, I don’t remember a God-damn thing that I saw. Nothing. Not a thing. At least my friend had a good time while he was doing it.”
While we might not, and probably won’t, remember everything, if we are having fun while we are doing it, at least we can enjoy it.
This week’s #wisdom_biscuit: seize the day!
What We Pass Down
July 17, 2026
“I have the honor of sitting with the Rabbi,” Martin says as I find my seat at the reception to celebrate his granddaughter’s Bat Mitzvah. At times like this, I’m not just Brian. I’m Rabbi Brian. A stand-in for God, Judaism, and all religious persons they’ve met in the past. ✧ ✧ ✧ “We pass the Torah from generation to
