Jewish Life Digital Edition October 2013 | Page 23

Yeshiva world, with most Torah scholars aspiring to reach this role. This clearly offered
career growth that we would not have experienced in a small American city.
Rav Mottel Katz stressed that the Yeshiva urgently needed someone to begin at
the start of the new school year, which was
just three weeks away. He went on to say:
“Rav Avrohom Chaim, the hanhala of the
Telshe Yeshiva, believes that you are the
person to accept this challenge.”
This time round, fate was determined to
do its job!
In fact, the offer could not have come at a
better time. We had spent four years in the
Telshe Kollel and with three children under
the age of three, twin girls and a six-month
old boy, life was difficult. We found it impossible to make ends meet on a kollel salary of
$55 per week, especially since we, as a young
couple, did not deny ourselves any indulgences we desired. Luckily we both came from
working-class families who lived frugally,
without having known the concept of luxury.

An accountant friend, Aaron Prero, who
often lunched with us on Shabbat, would
continually comment on what he considered to be too lavish a meal for people on a
shoe-string budget. “You are never going to
make it,” he would warn us. His sentiment
was sometimes supported even in the
mundane aspects of everyday living. When
the milkman collected payment for his deliveries, I wo ձ