The Pop Quiz Pizza

There were many things I hated about school, like getting up early, dealing with obnoxious kids, doing homework, and, oh yes, going to school. Even going home was a drag- either my parents were late picking me up or they didn’t pick me up at all, which I would only realize after I was the last one left standing outside after everyone had long since gone home. That usually happened around 45 minutes after dismissal. From there it was a 30 minute walk home, carrying/dragging my backpack, which weighed more than I did. G-d, how I hated school.
 
But there was one thing that was near the top of my school hate list- pop quizzes. They are designed to make people fail, and I’m convinced the teachers were intentionally trying to flunk us. If not, then they shouldn’t have counted towards our semester grades. They simply would have been a gauge to see if we were learning and understanding the material properly.
 
Did I mention that I hated teachers? (But not all of them- I liked the ones that gave me good grades!)
 
When I graduated High School I was thrilled to never have to deal with a pop quiz again- but I learned that life also hands us pop quizzes, and they’re much harder to pass. Tonight I almost failed mine.
 
Today was my oldest son’s 8^th birthday, and I told him we’d order pizza for dinner. He was so excited, until we spent nearly half an hour trying to find the number for the specific pizza place he wanted to order from. In the meantime, he found the number for another pizza place three times in a row- I should have seen the hint, but I was too stubborn. Hashem was like, “Hey, lady, order from this place! It’ll save you lots of aggravation!” But, no. I wasn’t listening.
 
We finally found the number, and I asked them about their specials. I ended up ordering a pie with a soda for 65 shekels. A few minutes later, I forgot that I didn’t tell him what soda we wanted, so I had my son call them back. No problem. About 20 minutes after that, the delivery guy shows up with a scowl on his face and no soda. I told him I would pay him 60 shekels, like the guy on the phone told me. He said no way, so I called the pizza guy back, who said no problem.
 
I gave Scowly Face Pizza Boy 100 shekels, and he gave me a bunch of coins and bolted. By the time I checked them, I realized he shorted me 5 shekels, so I went to the elevator, but I already heard the vvrrrooommm of his motorcycle as it took off like a rocket. I called the pizza place again, and the guy said they would send another delivery boy with the five shekel on his next run. Sure. I waited an hour, and still no delivery boy.
 
I called back again, but this time someone else answered. I tried to explain to the guy in Hebrew that he owed me 5 shekels. He said he had no idea what I was talking about, and refused to give me the money. I told him to put the other guy on the phone, and he was like, “What other guy? I’m the only one here!” You’ve got to be kidding. I asked him who was there an hour ago and he told me that he didn’t know! I was getting very frustrated by this point, and started to antagonize him: “What kind of business do you run that you don’t even know who’s working for you? Are you joking?”
 
“Are you joking?” he asks me. I was thrown off guard. “What? Am I joking?! No, I’m not joking, and I’m very upset!”  There was a lot of back and forth accusations until finally he hung up on me! At this point I was getting furious that the guy thought I was a teenage prank caller. I called him back and when he found out it was me, he yelled, “It’s YOU again?!” CLICK!
 
If I didn’t have to put the kids to sleep, I really would have driven over there and let him have it. I heard this faint voice in my head saying, “Why are you mad? Isn’t this situation happening because Hashem wants it to happen?” But I basically ignored it.
 
Oy, the aggravation! And all over 5 lousy shekels!
 
Later that night, I called my friend and fellow Breslev.co.il writer, Rajel Hayyim, and told her what happened. I have no tolerance for injustice, and needed someone to talk me down from my boiling anger. In three words, she was able to turn everything around: “It’s just a test.” Okay, four words. But then it clicked- yeah, it really was a test! The whole situation from beginning to end was absurd.
 
And almost immediately, I had a thought as to why it happened. Earlier that day I did a big favor for some people. Rebbe Nachman explains that when a person does something that brings light to the world, the accusers wake up and open up that person’s file to see if he’s worthy of the blessings he’s about to receive. It’s literally like opening up a can of worms- because whose file is perfect? Not mine, that’s for sure!
 
This spiritual law applies in a broader context: how many of us have noticed that when we began our spiritual journey, things got much more difficult? Before, everything was easier, there were less intense tests, and maybe life was less challenging overall. But once we began our path of teshuva, we became poster children for Murphy’s Law: “Everything that can go wrong, will go wrong.”
 
Rav Shalom Arush clarifies this spiritual law by pointing out another one: “Before a person can experience pleasure, he must experience pain.” I know, it sounds totally unfair. But you know what? It actually makes sense! He continues: “There is an iron-clad rule in spirituality- emuna precedes intellect.” Before we can understand a painful situation with our logic (if ever), we must have faith that it happened with a purpose and for our best. Our five senses are so limited; we will never instantly understand why we had to go through certain challenges. Therefore, we have two options: either use our emuna to help us survive those challenges and hopefully grow from them, or become victims of circumstance and have suffered in vain.
 
Too many times we choose the latter.
 
Will I ever logically understand the reason the pizza guy acted so bizarre? Probably not. But I have emuna that whatever the reason was, Hashem only wants the best for me.
 
And that is all I need to know.