Who is wise? The one who learns from every person.

It's a cliche, but illness really is as good teacher, and breast cancer taught me a lot. It taught me all of the cliche things about appreciating life and the remaining years, and it taught me not to be afraid of death. Another cliche: we should be more afraid of not living well during our time.

Education, success, and Judaism are the values I inherited from my parents. They did a good job of passing them on to me, and I have tried to live them in my own way as a model for you. For example, women did not wear tallit when I was growing up, but this is the one I bought to wear on your bar mitzvah. I love the design because that is what I felt like we were that day: a tree of life. Photo of tree of life on a Tallis

This letter opener belonged to my father. He used it to open each and every letter he received, not just the important ones, while I would rush to throw away the junky ones and tear open the ones addressed to me. This small mannerism says big things about father: how he saw potential in all things, even those that appeared to be junk; how he was thorough, and took time to do things properly and elegantly. Even though we don't use letters so much anymore, I keep this on my desk to remind me of my father and his way of being in the world.