Oh The Humanity Of It All

Its been a long time. Sorry. Some of you are actually upset with me and again I am sorry but that does make me feel special. So much has happened since the last time I posted. I was trying to find a common thread for all the things I want to get off my chest and I came up with this. As much as I would like to believe otherwise, when given a chance humanity will let you down.

A few crazy things have happened to me in the last 2 months. Some of them I should not have been shocked about and some just came out of nowhere.

It started while we were in NYC. I received an email that said someone was trying to login onto my computer in Israel on my alternate login. My virus protection lets you set up a second login. If anyone tries to sign onto it , they assume your computer has been stolen and send you an email.

I contacted the person who watches after our house when we are not there and he said he had just left the house a few hours ago and everything was fine. Then he mentions how for the first time he let the cleaning person stay without him as it was his wife's birthday and he was taking her out. Besides the cleaning woman  had been with us for a while. He knew her and assumed it would be fine.

He even gave her the key to lock up.

Realizing now that this might have be a mistake, he runs back to my house to find it completely trashed. Without getting into too much detail , they took almost anything of value that they could carry easily ( thank g-d I like big TV's) It was actually funny to see what they left behind, like some jewelry and silver items.

I guess crooks are more discerning these days.

I am not sure if any of you have ever been robbed, so let me tell you ,it sucks.

It is even worse when you are on the other side of the world and can't run back because you have your mothers 90th birthday party in a week.

To her credit, my wonderful daughter took it upon herself ( without being asked) to straighten the house out before we got back. That mitigated a lot of the trauma.

Speaking of trauma, when I got back to Israel, my office in NY informed me that I received two very large envelopes, return receipt. They asked if they should open them and I said yes. In each one was a book of over 100 pages one dated in April and one in June.

They were lawsuits.

I was being sued by someone, who, if you would have asked me the day before, I would have said I had a good relationship with. It was a business relationship but as recently as January I had done some big favors for him.

It seems that goodwill lasted about three months as the lawsuit was filled in April.

One of the problems of not being in the USA is that communication like this can get lost. This happened to me last year when the IRS imposed a big fine on a company I owned but had closed several years before, They kept sending letters but no one responded.

They don't like that.

The letters  were going to the wrong address but no matter, that is considered my problem. After a bunch of anxiety and money ( to my accountant) we were able to correct the issue. I owed them nothing.

Back to the story

When I saw that one of these books was dated in April I knew I had a big problem.

I did.

This person had won a summary judgment against me because I failed to respond to the summons .

Everyone in the office says they never received the summonses but it is irrelevant. I had/have a big problem.

The first few days I was in total shock. It was not because I was being sued. You can not own a business for over 30 years and not get sued at least once. It was because here was a guy I knew for the last 6 years, who I didn't suspect at all I had a problem with, was/is suing me for a nice chunk of my net worth.

I like to think of myself as being street smart but I never saw this coming. In fact going over 6 years of emails I now realize how dumb I was as he as planning this for a long time.

Who does that??

Did I mention that he and his partner are Haredi

I know that has nothing to do with it. I am just pissed. It could have been anyone.

When I received the lawsuit it took me a few days to get a complete copy. I did not want to wait so I called the 'plaintiff'. I asked him what is going on. He said what do you mean. I replied 'I have not seen the documents yet but you're suing me'.

He said " really, I know nothing about it let me ask my partner and get back to you"

I said fine but I knew he would't.

The next day I received the documentation.

He had signed EVERYTHING.

This is a week before Rosh Hashana.

Dude come on

I have since calmed down, gotten myself some good representation and will now hope for the best. ( I am sure I will post updates)

I am now trying to  calm down about being let down by people in my synagogue. I can not go into too much detail as I have been told that some people are upset by what I write here.

The people who run the shul do so as volunteers. It is not easy for them.

There is no Rabbi who has authority to settle grievances.

I have a lot of respect for the Va'ad. I consider many of them to be friends and I know they don't have it easy.

Lots of people are complaining all the time about the most mundane things ( I am guilty of that as well) but this is no excuse for being lied to by one of them and  let down by a few others.

What I have come to realize in my almost three years living here is that you basically have two types of people. Those looking to avoid conflict at any cost and those who browbeat them because they can. Instead of doing whats right , people do what is easy. I know this and yet I still feel let down. I should't but maybe I expect too much.

I can understand why someone who volunteers would try to avoid confrontation. For those who know me well , that is not what I would have done but c'est la vie.

I am actually a bit suprised with myself on not losing it over the current issue. I guess Grumpshood has mellowed me a bit. ( my grandkids call me grumps)

The flip side of all this is that I have MANY good friends who are willing and do go out of their way for me. Like the two who let me invite 8 people to their shabbat tables this summer. Or the one who helped me get some legal advise etc.. That is what keeps me trusting, knowing and surrounding myself with good people and friends.

People much better than myself.

It would be a shame to live the rest of my life thinking that humanity as a whole is crappy. It may be true but it doesn't have to be my life. I just need to be a bit more careful and  realistic.

So, again I am sorry for not posting more often but, as you can see,  I have been a bit busy.

I have so much more to say. I am not sure you know , but there were elections here. I also have lice updates but these will have to wait. I will try to post more often but I am not making any promises. I just swore off all my bad promises this morning and want to wait a bit before I start again

Shana Tova Umitukah.