ANCHORED
DREAMS®
MORE
BOOKS WRITTEN & EDITED BY AZRIELA JAFFE
"Heart
Warmers"
Adams Media, Inc., May 2000
"Heart
Warmers of Love"
Adams Media, Inc., May 2001
"The Idiot's Guide to Flying and Gliding,"
Macmillan Publishers
"The Idiot's Guide to Beating Debt,"
Macmillan Publishers
"Honey,
I Want to Start my Own Business, A
Planning Guide for Couples"
"Heart
Warmers"
Adams Media, Inc., May 2000
Author: Azriela Jaffe |
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Introduction
by Azriela Jaffe - Read an excerpt
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Introduction
by Azriela Jaffe
When Lee
Simonson emailed me and asked me if I'd like to begin receiving
his new electronic magazine, called Heartwarmers4u,
I said, "SURE," not because I understood anything about the
list, but just because Lee asked and I thought he was a cool
guy. Lee and I have known each other for a few years, meeting
when I interviewed him for his expertise for my book, ""Starting
from No: Ten Strategies to Overcome Your Fear of Rejection and
Succeed in Business." Frankly, I couldn't imagine any ezine
I would look forward to receiving every day. I already receive
something like 300 emails a day, and this seemed as if it would
be burdensome. But I didn't want to let Lee down, and there
was something amusing about not rejecting the guy I had interviewed
about how to handle rejection.
Hah! Turns
out, what he offered was one of the greatest Internet gifts
I've ever received.
I was
quickly transformed from wondering if I'd enjoy the list, to
considering it one of my top favorites. It only got better and
better, and the longer I was on the list, the more an idea jelled
in my head. Why not assemble the best of the best, the heartwarmer
stories that draw the most email responses and generate the
strongest heartfelt responses from the tens of thousands of
members of this online community, and put them into a book?
Certainly, those who eagerly await their heartwarmers in the
morning, would appreciate a book they could purchase for themselves
and their friends of their favorite stories. And this would
also be a way to spread the word to others who are not yet familiar
with Heartwarmers4u.
I·¿ưand
in a quintessential Lee manner, he said, "Sure, go ahead." And
so, we did.
Selecting
and editing the stories for this book was an awesome task. I
had the privilege of reading every heartwarmer story ever written
- hundreds of them! Winnowing down so many great stories to
about eighty stories was no easy job. And then, there was the
editing.
At first
I was leary - would the writers of these deeply personal stories
allow me to offer my professional editing expertise? Would they
be offended if I requested changes to their stories, or suggested
new ways to express their stories? After all, I was messing
with their "babies!"
To the
authors' credit, they responded with gratitude, joy, and complete
cooperation, as we came together as partners to make their stories
the best they could be. Instead of responding defensively, they
were delighted that their stories were chosen as award-winning
heartwarmers, and they were open to shaping them into final
masterpieces.
I have
only one problem with this book. My job as writer and editor
is now over, and I'm going to miss one of the most heartwarming
experiences of my life. But that's okay. We hope there will
be many heartwarmers books. Enjoy!
Excerpt:
The heartwarmers
collection is a diverse assembly of writers from all over the
USA. Here is one of three stories included in the collection,
written by Azriela Jaffe
ELIJAH
This morning,
our feisty, rambunctious sixteen-month-old, Elijah, pulled a
chair over to the water cooler on the kitchen counter and opened
the spigot, laughing with utter delight as the water poured
out all over him and the floor. This willful behavior is nothing
new. In fact, it was present even before he was born.
Following
the birth of our daughter Elana in 1996, my husband Stephen
and I agreed that we were DONE having children. Elana's older
sister Sarah had been born sixteen months earlier and we were
also raising two teenage boys from Stephen's first marriage.
Sarah was born at home, and we planned the same for Elana, but
complications put me into the hospital for the birth. We decided
I would get my tubes tied while I was there.
Elana
arrived in the world at 7 AM and they scheduled me for the surgery
at 4 PM, telling me I couldn't eat anything the rest of the
day because of the impending surgery. Hungry enough from labor
to eat an entire large pizza by myself, I told my husband we
were going home with our new baby. I'd come back some other
time to get tied up. We weren't going to be making love anytime
soon, anyway!
We scheduled
the procedure again but a few days before the planned event,
I came down with the worst case of flu in my life. I thought
I was going to die. It took over three weeks to recover from
that bout of the flu and surgery was out of the question. We
needed to reschedule the procedure once more. Like the girl
who cried wolf, I didn't know if the doctor would believe me
if I scheduled it a third time. And since this was the first
and only time that I came down with the flu in my life, I was
beginning to wonder if God was giving me a message.
Soon after
recovering from the flu, I returned to swimming laps at the
health club as is my daily practice. As I swam my laps, I suddenly
experienced the presence of a little boy telling me that he
wanted to come into our family. I even knew his name - Elijah.
According to him, we were not finished having children. He wanted
to be born, and he wanted us as his family. I kept trying to
push him away, but his energy was palpable to me; he kept pulling
me back.
I told
my husband about my experience when I got home. He gave me "the
look" and basically said, "That's interesting, dear. Get over
it." Having another child was not up for discussion. There were
already nineteen years between his children, and the idea of
three babies under age four was a bit much to consider. Feeling
superstitious, we avoided having relations during the most fertile
time in my cycle, and we increased our diligence with birth
control. We decided that one of us needed to be "fixed" very
soon, and we made plans.
From that
day forward, this little boy, Elijah, was with me all the time,
speaking to me at any moment I would listen. I felt trapped.
I wanted to do the right thing, but we were broke, tired, and
maxed out. My husband was definitely not open to a conversation
about having another child just because I was hearing voices.
The next
month, my period was late. The only other times in my adult
life I had been late was when I was carrying my girls. I knew
I was pregnant with Elijah. While my husband was at work, I
took a home pregnancy test to confirm what I already knew. The
bright blue check-mark popped out in less than a minute. Elijah
had willed his way into our family despite our fears and objections.
He's a wise soul - he knew better than we did that this was
the right decision.
That evening,
after putting Sarah and Elana to bed, I handed my husband a
brandy and uttered those words every man dreads: "Honey, we
need to talk." He already suspected - he knew I was late. I
told him simply, "I am pregnant." I waited for the eruption.
God bless him, he only took my hand and calmly said, "Okay."
He knew too, that this was something much larger than the two
of us.
Three
months into the pregnancy, I was preparing for bed when I was
alarmed to feel a gush of water rushing down my leg. I cried
for my husband, called a neighbor to stay in the house with
our sleeping babies, and we raced to the emergency room. The
doctor told us that she was going to insert a piece of litmus
paper into the area where the fluid was leaking. If the paper
turned purple, it was amniotic fluid which indicated that the
fetus was in trouble. We held our breath and before our eyes,
the paper turned quickly, and vividly, purple. I started to
sob and my husband looked grim. They gave Elijah a 10-20% chance
of survival. They sent me to bed as we prayed for a miracle.
Although
we hadn't asked for another
child,
God had placed him with us anyway. We could have been delighted
by this turn of events - a natural way of eliminating the problem
of an unwanted pregnancy. But both my husband and I had fallen
in love with this little soul. Now we'd fight for his life.
At 1:00
AM, upon returning from the hospital, I sent an urgent email
message to thousands of subscribers to an online newsletter
I publish, "The Entrepreneurial Couples Success Newsletter."
I asked for their prayers for Elijah. Over the next two days,
we were flooded with hundreds of prayers by email, fax, and
phone, from all over the world. Subscribers of all faiths not
only prayed for Elijah directly, but they passed the request
on to their Rabbis, Ministers, and prayer groups of all kinds.
A week
later, my husband drove me to the follow-up doctor's appointment.
We braced ourselves for bad news, but intuitively, I believed
that I was fine, and that Elijah had made it. Ah, the relief
and joy in hearing the physician's words, "I see no evidence
of any amniotic fluid loss. Your baby is completely fine. I
wonder if you were misdiagnosed by the doctor you saw in emergency."
My husband and I had witnessed that litmus paper turning purple.
We knew this was no misdiagnosis - it was a miracle. Our prayers
and others for Elijah had been answered. Once again, he had
fought to be born, and won.
My pregnancy
continued uneventfully. Elijah Mordecai Jaffe was born at home
as planned on March 29,1998, a healthy beautiful little boy.
We can not imagine our family complete without him. Thank God
this willful child insisted on being born into our family. He
is far more of a blessing than the burden we feared. Even if
today, he climbed up on the kitchen table and threw the food
off on to the floor, and then he yanked the family computer
keyboard off of the desk, just to hear it crash. Every time
he exerts his will - which is about one hundred times a day,
we remind ourselves, it is this force in his soul and personality
that brought him here in the first place. v --Azriela Jaffe
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"Heart
Warmers of Love"
Adams Media, Inc., May 2001
Author: Azriela Jaffe |
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Several
authors share their heartwarming true stories of love, romance,
and friendship.
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| "Mirror
Image" by Azriela Jaffe
My seven-year-old
daughter, Sarah, is the spitting image of me. Her thick wavy
brown hair and brown eyes with a slight oriental shape to them
look identical to baby pictures of me from that same age. She's
a cuddly, robust, sunny child with a pudgy belly, portraying
her love for sweets and enthusiasm about eating, and her genetic
disposition toward overweight.
>From
the moment she was born, family has commented on the resemblance
between Sarah and me. As she grows older, she only looks more
and more like her mama. Gazing at my daughter is like looking
in a mirror that allows me to peek into my childhood.
My six-year-old
daughter, Elana, looks like she was either adopted, or born
from an illicit affair with a man other than her daddy. Trust
me, she's ours. But with fine blond hair and striking blue eyes,
and a fragile looking body that bespeaks her finicky eating
habits, as hard as I have tried, I have been unable to come
up with one single physical resemblance between she and I.
The only
way we are sure that she came from me is witnessing the birth
process I went through to bring her into this world. She was
not switched at birth in the hospital, we are reassured. If
you look really, really hard, you might see a bit of grandpa's
eyes in hers, and the shape of her face somewhat resembles her
daddy's. Somewhat -- it's a bit of a stretch. Elana will tell
you: "I don't look like anyone in my family!"
Elana and
Sarah are inseparable sisters, connected at the hip, and constantly
playing or fighting with one another. Never fails, when someone
new meets them for the first time, they pause, look them over
carefully and declare: "My goodness, they look nothing
like one another!" Yes, it's true, my daughters are as
different as night and day.
The ways
that Elana differs from her mama extends beyond her physical
appearance. Whereas my mother reports that I was an even-tempered
happy baby, and my disposition these days is rather steady and
calm, Elana breaks into hysteria and wails of disappointment
and whining at the first hint of a disappointment. She is easily
upset and a temperamental, moody child.
Elana also
has the greatest laugh I've ever heard when her daddy tickles
her. The same child's spirit that easily descends into despair
when she doesn't get her way also rises like a helium balloon
when she has a tickle session with her daddy, or gets hold of
one of her favorite foods, or is engaged in play with her beloved
sister or a favored babysitter.
Loving
Sarah comes naturally to me. She is like an extension of myself,
and since her disposition is almost always happy and sweet,
it doesn't take any effort to love her. In fact, her nickname
in the daycare she attended was "easy money."
I love
Elana as much as her sister. But it didn't come as naturally.
The bond was not as intense and immediate. I don't look into
her cherubic face and see myself, or her daddy, reflected back
to me. I have had to work harder at loving her despite, and
in the middle of, her mood swings. I have come to accept her
very particular food preferences, and her tendency to rise two
hours later than the rest of the household, along with the challenge
that brings of getting her out of bed on school days! Sometimes,
frankly, Elana drives me a bit batty.
And yet,
I see how the differences between Elana and her sister, and
between Elana and me, are an incredible blessing, and this is
exactly how it is meant to be. Sisters so close in age are natural
competitors. If Elana was beautiful in the same way as Sarah,
others would always be comparing them, with one of them winning
the "most beautiful" category.
Now, it
is impossible to declare which of my beauties wins the contest.
They are both gorgeous in completely different ways. Do you
prefer the looks of the stunning, take-your-breath-away radiance
of a dark-haired little girl, or the angelic loveliness of a
wisp of a child who looks at you with her baby blues and melts
your heart?
Which one
of my little girls is the smarter one, or the tougher one, or
the most clever? Each in her own way demonstrates those qualities
as much as the other, just differently. Sibling rivalry is ever-present
in our household, especially when it comes to competing for
the affection of their mama, but I don't worry at all about
the girls being compared to one another, with one always feeling
the lesser in comparison to the other.
The girls
have the opportunity to be close sisters, yet entirely individuals
-- something that would have been much more difficult if they
were the spitting image of each other.
I have
also come to see another blessing in Elana's unique appearance
and personality. When I gaze into Elana's face, it might not
appear as if I am looking in a looking glass, but she mirrors
me in many, not as obvious, ways. Elana plays out the temperamental
nature I would probably display if I were not so controlled
and self-disciplined. Elana giggles like I wish I could if I
could relax my self-consciousness. Elana loves to play, something
that I don't take the time for much anymore.
Elana mirrors
aspects of the girl I wish I could be, if I were able to take
off the adult mask and just be myself.
I say,
"just be myself", even though, apparently, there's
little about Elana that is just like myself. That is only true
at a surface level. Elana is very much "her mother's daughter."
She and I share a secret, one she is too young now to appreciate.
If her
mama could relax and give up all pretenses of being the perfect
mother, wife, and daughter, she would probably act in the world
a whole lot like Elana. Elana is my mirror image, reflecting
aspects of me that are undeveloped, hidden from view, or secondary
to my primary nature. She completes me, instead of just reflecting
me.
As for
the blond hair and blue eyes, I figure God placed her in such
a body so that she and I could keep this revelation a secret.
That way, when she's acting out in a less-than-pleasing manner,
I can detach from the scene and say, with amazement, "This
is my daughter?" "Where did she come from?"
******
Elana,
her sister Sarah, and her brother Elijah continue to be, in
their mama's eyes, three of the most beautiful, charming, loving,
and fantastic kids in the universe. Yes, mama is a bit biased,
but really, it's true.
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| NEW!
"What Do You Mean, You Can't Eat in My Home?"
Author, Azriela Jaffe |
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"What
do you mean, you can't come to your own niece's bat mitzvah?"
"What do you mean, you won't be coming to the family Passover
seder anymore?" "What do you mean, you're dropping
out of college and going to Yeshiva?" "Have you lost
your mind? Joined a cult? Don't you love our family anymore?!""
Answers and real-life solutions to these tricky family situations.
. . . and more.
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"Honey,
I Want to Start my Own Business, A Planning Guide for Couples"
Author: Azriela Jaffe |
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Honey,
I Want to Start my Own Business, A Planning Guide for Couples
presents a no nonsense approach to decreasing the stresses of
business ownership on marriages and other intimate relationships.
Just as every entrepreneur formulates a cogent and workable
business plan, Honey recommends creating a family plan to protect
vital relationships from the hardships self-employment often
entails. Honey covers every aspect of concern, from financial,
time, and travel considerations to the impact of an entrepreneurial
business on a couple's sexual, romantic, and emotional lives
and the well-being of their children.
"Honey,
I Want to Start my Own Business, A Planning Guide for Couples,"
which was originally published in 1996, is now out of print.
The author has a limited supply in inventory. To order, please
send check payable to Azriela Jaffe, to 793 Sumter Drive, Yardley,
PA 19067, for $15.00, including shipping.
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