Wanna see what it looked like to send out 160 straws?

My son Shimi put this together after a week of chaos and crafts:

I love giving gifts.

But not just gifts.

Not the Amazon kind of gifts. Not the click, ship, arrive tomorrow kind of gifts. (Though, let’s be honest, I’m very grateful those exist too.)

I mean the kind of gift that says, "I see you; I've been thinking of you."

A gift that lets you know you’re not just a name on a list or a face in a crowd or an email address in a system. You’re a person.

There’s something so lovely about helping people feel seen in that way.

Last week, I sent out an email asking if anyone wanted me to mail them a straw.

A straw.

Not a diamond bracelet. Not a gift card. Not a luxury item wrapped in tissue paper.

A straw.

Something most of you probably already have in your kitchen cabinet.

And 160 of you responded.

One hundred and sixty.

How awesome is that?

I didn’t expect so many responses. I thought a handful of you might write back. Maybe twenty. Maybe thirty if y'all were feeling bored.

But then the replies kept coming in.

And with them came addresses and also beautiful little notes. Tiny glimpses into your lives. Reflections. Excitement. Gratitude. Curiosity. A kind of personal sweetness that made the whole thing feel much bigger than a straw.

I read every single one.

And I was beyond touched.

Thank you.

The sheer volume of responses told me that my message last week landed in a big way.

The human element of connection is so underrated.

We live in a world of automated everything. Automated emails. Automated reminders. Automated checkouts. Automated birthday messages from people who definitely did not remember your birthday.

And so much of it is useful.

But useful is not the same as meaningful; efficient is not the same as intimate.

There’s something about opening your mailbox and finding an actual envelope. Addressed to you. With your name written by hand. Something that had to be folded, sealed, stamped, carried, sorted, delivered.

That seems to matter.

Even when the thing inside is just a straw.

Maybe especially when the thing inside is a straw.

Because then it’s not really about the object.

It’s about the feeling. It’s about being remembered. It’s about receiving something that didn’t have to happen.

I really did mean to send you a straw from my kitchen.

That was the original plan.

Very casual. Very simple. Very me.

But then I thought, nah.

It would be much cooler if I got really nice straws.

Bamboo ones.

Beautiful. Natural. A little earthy. A little elevated. A little more “I put thought into this” and a little less “I grabbed this from beside the coffee.”

So I ordered bamboo straws.

And then I learned that bamboo straws are basically impossible to cut.

So naturally, I then bought myself some power tools.

Because apparently this is who I am now.

A woman with 160 bamboo straws, a mailing list, and a saw.

And I have to tell you, learning to use it was extremely satisfying.

I’m a crafts person at heart. I love tools. I love supplies. I love the moment where an idea becomes physical and you have to figure out how to make your hands cooperate with your vision.

And then I learned, once again, that if I’m going to buy a tool, I should just get the better, more expensive one up front.

When will I finally learn that cheap actually comes at a price?

The price, in this case, was time.

A lot of time.

Because sawing 160 bamboo straws by hand with a cheapy little tool off Amazon takes forever.

Noted for next time. 

And then, because simply mailing you a straw was clearly not extra enough, I decided they should become necklaces.

Because of course it’s much more fun if you can wear your breathwork straw around your neck.

So then came the drilling. Two tiny holes in each tiny straw.

And then came the threading.

One at a time.

One straw.

One string.

Many frustrated attempts (with my tongue sticking out of course.)

Until at some point, my oldest, Shimi, walked in and casually pointed out that I could have threaded a whole bunch of them first and then cut the strings to size after.

Which would have saved me a ridiculous amount of time.

Thanks, Shimi.

So helpful. (So late.)

But that was part of the fun too.

Because this whole thing became one big lesson in how much more there is to every simple interaction than we think.

Send a straw, I said.

So easy, I said.

And then suddenly I'm researching postage.

Because now the envelopes had a straw necklace and a card inside, and I got nervous that the post office wouldn’t take them.

So I had to find out how much weight a Forever stamp covers.

One ounce.

Your envelopes weighed in at just under half an ounce.

Whew.

Then I ran out of stamps almost immediately and had to figure out where normal people buy stamps in the middle of the night when the post office is closed.

Apparently Walgreens pharmacy has those.

Then I ran out of envelopes.

Because somehow, even after seeing 160 responses, my brain was still operating under the illusion that I had enough envelopes in the house.

I did not.

So I ran out for more. (Walgreens to the rescue again!)

Because once you have sawed and drilled and threaded 160 bamboo straws, you do not let a lack of envelopes be the thing that takes you down.

Then I had to print the straw breathing cards.

You know, the ones I designed to go along with the straws.

And alas, they are those slightly fuzzy ChatGPT generated images I bemoaned in my last email.

Oh well.

We’re human.

There’s probably a teaching in there too.

Something about the gap between vision and execution.

Something about beauty not needing to be perfect in order to be received.

Something about sending the thing anyway.

And then I had to print more, because I ran out of the first hundred in one night.

Then came the addressing.

All of your envelopes.

By hand.

I loved this part and also my hand almost fell off.

About twenty addresses in, I realized that a good pen is an absolute game changer.

Thank you, branded Vessel pen.

The difference between a mediocre pen and a fabulous pen when you’re hand-addressing 160 envelopes is a bigger deal than I ever knew.

And then there was the unexpected delight of realizing how many of you are literally my neighbors.

I knew some of you were local, but I was genuinely surprised by how many envelopes were headed to Brooklyn streets I know. Boro Park. Flatbush. Right here. Around the corner. A few blocks over. Places I drive through all the time.

There was something so strange and sweet about writing your addresses and realizing, wait, you’re right here.

You’re not an abstract reader somewhere out there in internet land.

You’re my neighbor.

But you aren't limited to Brooklyn.

By the time I was done, I think I knew the zip codes for Monsey, Spring Valley, Monroe, Boro Park, Flatbush, and Lakewood by heart.

Who needs geography class when you have a mailing list and a stack of envelopes?

There was a whole internal debate about whether or not to add a return addresses.

Responsible Fally said yes.

Tired Fally said absolutely not.

Tired Fally won.

My son Elimelech offered to hand deliver the ones in our area, which was very nice of him.

But he quickly bailed when he realized how many there were.

Can’t blame him.

There were ten requests from overseas, which I still have to figure out.

My daughter Dassa did all the folding of the flyers. Because my hands were tired. 

And since I didn’t want to give any of you the nasty flu I had last week, I used a sponge to seal the envelopes.

(And also, because envelopes taste yuck.)

Deeds helped mail them all.

Which means this became a full family project.

There were straws everywhere. String everywhere. Cards everywhere. Envelopes everywhere.

My normal life was briefly swallowed by bamboo, postage, zip codes, and breathwork instructions.

And it was wonderful.

It took up our space. It took up our time. It took up our hands. And also our hearts.

There was laughter. There was problem solving. There was mild chaos. There were a lot of “wait, where did I put the stamps?” moments.

And there was this really beautiful feeling of all of us being part of sending something good into the world.

So thank you for that.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to do something a little ridiculous, a little inconvenient, a little handmade, and very full of heart.

I really believe that what we put out into the world helps generate the world we get to live in.

Life is complicated. People are complicated. Pain is real. Systems are messy. Some things are deeply unfair.

But still.

What we put out into the world matters.

I chose to put 160 gifts out into my world. 

The way we choose to respond to a world that can feel so cold and automated and transactional matters.

Every time we choose warmth, we add warmth.

Every time we choose presence, we add presence.

Every time we go slightly out of our way to make someone feel seen, we make the world a little more human.

It’s my birthday next week, and birthdays always make me reflective.

Another year. Another cycle. Another chance to ask, why am I here?

Why did Hashem bring me into the world at this time, in this body, with this voice, this heart, these gifts, these wounds, these children, these students, this work, this exact life?

What am I meant to bring into the world that could only come through me?

I don’t know that I have answers.

Maybe we never fully do.

Maybe we get little pieces at a time.

A room we’re meant to walk into. A child we’re meant to mother. A sentence we’re meant to say. A breath we’re meant to catch. A person we’re meant to help feel less alone.

A straw we’re meant to mail.

And maybe that’s enough.

Because if I can be the reason you smiled when you opened your mailbox, that lights me up.

If I can remind you to exhale a little longer, that matters to me.

If I can help you feel, even for a moment, that there is still goodness in the world, that feels like a pretty good use of a life.

Take that breath!

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Those two Azamra seats are still waiting for you. Reply to this email to apply.

We start June 7!