Elana Zaiman - The Forever Letter: Writing What We Believe For Those We Love

Llewellyn Publications

Woodbury, Minnesota

Copyright Information

The Forever Letter: Writing What We Believe for Those We Love 2017 by Elana Zaiman.

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First e-book edition 2017

E-book ISBN: 9780738753720

Book design by Bob Gaul
Cover design by Ellen Lawson

Editing by Laura Graves

Llewellyn Publications is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Zaiman, Elana, 1962 author.

Title: The forever letter: writing what we believe for those we love / Elana

Zaiman.

Description: First Edition. | Woodbury: Llewellyn Worldwide, Ltd., 2017. |

Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017029246 (print) | LCCN 2017021581 (ebook) | ISBN

9780738753720 (ebook) | ISBN 9780738752884

Subjects: LCSH: Wills, EthicalHistory and criticism. | Wills,

EthicalAuthorship. | Letters of last instructions. | Last letters before

death. | Conduct of life.

Classification: LCC BJ1286.W6 (print) | LCC BJ1286.W6 Z89 2017 (ebook) | DDC

170/.44dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017029246

Llewellyn Publications does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibility concerning private business arrangements between our authors and the public.

Any Internet references contained in this work are current at publication time, but the publisher cannot guarantee that a specific reference will continue or be maintained. Please refer to the publishers website for links to current author websites.

Llewellyn Publications

Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

2143 Wooddale Drive

Woodbury, MN 55125

www.llewellyn.com

Manufactured in the United States of America

In honor of my mother, Ann, and my father, Joel

My teachers from the beginning

My teachers to this day

and

In memory of their son, my brother, Rafael Moshe.

Contents

• : My Fathers Forever Letter to His Children
• : Why Write a Forever Letter?
• : Why We Resist
• : What Matters Most?
• : How to Increase Our Chances of Being Heard
• : What to Avoid
• : Thoughts on the Writing Process
• : Writing Prompts
• : Write and Edit Your Forever Letter

Appendix A: A Brief
History of the Ethical Will

Appendix B: A Forever
Letter to My Son

Copyright Listing

Eleazar the Great, Paths of Life, Rabbenu Asher, The Rule, and Judah Ibn Tibbon, A Fathers Admonition (Hebrew text found in Hebrew Ethical Wills , by Israel Abrahams, Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society, 2006). English translation by Dr. Rabbi Moshe Shualy (2014, unpublished). Used with permission of translator.

Mordechai Mottel Michelsohn, The Ethical Will of Mordechai Mottel Michelsohn (Hebrew text found in Sefer Beit Meshulam , Petrikov: Rabbi Natan Natah Kronenberg, 1905). English translation by Dr. Rabbi Moshe Shualy and Mordechai Shualy (2016, unpublished). Used with permission of translator.

Dawna Markova, May we learn to open in love in Prayers for Healing: 365 Blessings, Poems, & Meditations from Around the World . Edited by Maggie Oman Shannon (Boston, Massachusetts: Conari Press, 2000), 41. 2000 Dawna Markova, Ph.D., www.PTPinc.org.

Nancy Wood 1974 Nancy C. Wood, reprinted from Many Winters , courtesy of the Nancy Wood Literary Trust.

Chip Ward, A Letter of Apology to My Granddaughter. TomDispatch.com: A Regular Antidote to the Mainstream Media (March 27, 2012). http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175521/. Used with permission of The Nation Institute.

Jodi Picoult, An Open Letter to My Oldest Son, as He Leaves for College, from Leaving Home: Short Pieces (Newton Highlands, MA: LGLA/Kindle Single, 2011). Used with permission of the author.

Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles , DVD (2007), dirs. Yimou Zhang and Yasuo Furuhata (United States: Sony Pictures Classics, 2005). Used with permission of Creative Artists Agency.

Herman Wouk, The Caine Mutiny (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1951), 5961, 62. Reprinted with permission from BSW Literary Agency.

David Segal, interview with Rebecca Gee, Parent Trap, Episode 401 (Act One: Latter Day Saint), on This American Life , Chicago Public Media (February 19, 2010). http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/401/parent-trap. Used with permission.

A Note to Readers

Many of the names, identities, places, and time frames in this book have been changed to protect peoples privacy. On occasion I have created one person to stand for a composite of people, and I have altered the facts of a few stories while remaining true to their essence.

Introduction

What a lot we lost when we stopped writing letters.
You cant reread a phone call.

Liz Carpenter

The Power of Letters

Years ago, we wrote letters to communicate with one another. These days, we text, instant message, and tweet. We tend to think of letter writing as old-fashioned and unnecessarya craft of bygone days, a relic of ancient timesmuch like a horse-drawn carriage, an icebox, or an oil lamp, but letter writing need not be relegated to the past.

Born in the early sixties, I grew up in what was still a letter-writing generation. To this day, I keep a box of letters Ive saved over the years: letters from summer camp, Junior Year Abroad, and from my professional years as a rabbi and a chaplain. Letters from my parents, grandparents, brothers and sister, aunts and uncles, cousins, friends, boyfriends, teachers, mentors, students, nieces. Letters from my husband, Seth, and my son, Gabriel. I also keep a three-ring binder of loving e-mail letters from family and friends that Ive printed out over the past decade for fear they would get lost in the virtual world or deleted because of a computer crash.

On days when I feel out of sorts, I return to these letters. They strengthen me when I dont believe in myself, remind me who I am when I question my purpose or my values, and enable me to better reflect on my relationships and on my life. As I reread these letters, I experience a sense of gratitude for the love, concern, appreciation, compassion, kindness, wisdom, guidance, and honesty that many of these letters impart. I also experience a sense of gratitude toward the people who took the time to write them.