I have an old friend from my teenage years named J. J is the person for whom things always work out in the craziest ways. I always joke that people hand J money. It's not far from the truth. When J was flying to Miami once, the head stewardess announced over the loudspeaker that J should come to the front of the plane upon landing. "You have won a VIP escort." J stepped out of the plane and nearly fell on a bright pink golf cart with J's name in digital letters scrolling across the top. Drinks were offered, and off they went to see to J's baggage.

 J and I have traveled the world together over the years. My job is to stand behind the invisible red line and look nonchalant whenever J approaches an airline desk. This is a person who knows the system and has tremendous “good fortune” when it comes to planes. "Say YES!" J barked at me in Hong Kong, interrupting my people-watching. "Huh? Uh... YES!"  

"What am I saying yes to?" I whispered.   "You just agreed that it's okay that you'll get the regular kosher meal instead of the business class kosher meal in your free business class seat home."   "OH! Well..." I began sarcastically... "Don't talk!" I giggled and sat on my suitcase.

 The other night I was at a small party. Ten people and eight raffle prizes. I knew before the raffle began that I was going to be one of the two that didn't win. Of course that's what happened. I thought to myself "J, would have won the free massage".

 Just last week I lost a screw that holds the handle on my favorite purse the same day J lost a unique button from a Canadian sweater. I turned over the house, car and office before paying a $60 repair (which lasted all of 2 days), while J celebrated being reunited with the button that was found in shul. And so it goes with everything.

 I've always sort of seen myself as the black cat with the rain cloud over its head. Over years of deals that fell through, broken promises, unraveled projects, shidduch meetings I worked so hard on that got poor attendance, I have discussed it with professionals who have always said it isn't my destiny, as I have come to believe, it's the people I surround myself with who are not reliable or true to their word. Some version of “your parents weren’t reliable, so you subconsciously surround yourself with people who are like that, because it’s familiar” has been fed to me. And so, over the years, I have shuffled out the biggest offenders. But it’s more than that. My mother, she should rest in peace, used to warn me not to fall asleep at night because I might wake up with my hair chopped off. She’d even wish bad on me. Once she wished my first husband would be hit by a truck. Today my father still warns me about things like the lawnmower blowing up in my face. Its inculcation at its best.

 But with all the cognitive and psychodynamic work in the world, and my eyes goggling from months of EMDR, somehow, unless I'm following J across Cambodia, my grand plans somehow fizzle, despite my best efforts. J left me in a garden for an hour in Moscow once, to go check out an exhibit I had no interest in. In five minutes, I almost sat on some guy’s pet iguana.

 Just a few weeks ago, I was excited to be invited to give a lecture. Three days later they called me back that the state just changed its requirements. In order to be able to give continuing education credits, I now need to be a university professor. “I see. Ok, Thanks.”

 I’ve tried to hearten myself by saying each time, "ooh, I just got schar in shamayim!" But there are days I often wonder what I'm going to do alone in the giant tent mansion I build with my huge piece of Leviathan skin. Recently, as I mature, I've come to realize that it can't be right to see J as nebuch, the unfortunate soul who is going to have all the reward in this world and none in the world to come. Actually, it's a pretty disgusting way to think.

Recently, as a fancy Ritz-Carlton wedding in Florida fast approached, J couldn't get a ticket to pop up on the internet at a remotely reasonable price. Every day for weeks I heard about the decision making, "Fly to Tampa and take a bus? Rent a car out of fort Myers?" J was determined to get to this wedding, and it was not lost on me that every conversation ended in, "I'm not worried. It's all going to work out in the end. It always does." Five days before the wedding, a direct ticket that was previously invisible appeared on the internet. "I told you it would work out. It always does!" I scratched my head.

I sat at the kitchen table the other morning sipping coffee and thought about what I needed to do. I said out loud, "Ok Hashem. Going forward I'm going to start to believe that everything is going to work out. Like J".  In that moment as if in response, an unusual morning text rolled in from J (a planet not usually heard from until about 2 p.m.)  "Tell yourself everything is going to work out."

I sat down on my chair and giggled. This friend wasn’t sent to torture me. This friend was sent to show me.

Oh, and that lecture? They called me back to speak at the annual Social Work Month celebration instead.

Lili Bernstein Goralnick, LCSW-R

Monsey, NY