TorahAnytime - Everywhere But Nowhere - R. Paysach Krohn - TorahAnytime.com

Short Summary

Main recommendation: Fathers should make time for their children instead of letting work and busyness crowd out family life, even if the time spent is simple, like a trip on the Newark Airport AirTrain. The story uses a Lakewood rebbe taking his six children out for four hours so his wife could prepare for Pesach, and a pilot whose absence from his children's lives leads to a lesson about what truly matters.

Key Points

• The rebbe's wife asked for four hours without the children so she could bake, cook, and clean before Pesach, and the rebbe took the children out to give her that time.
• The rebbe chose the Newark Airport AirTrain, which kept the children occupied for about two hours of riding and let them watch planes take off and land near the runway.
• A pilot who boarded the train asked the children where they were flying, and the father explained they were "flying nowhere" because they were out of the house for the holiday preparation.
• The pilot, after 25 years of flying, shared that he had missed his son's birthday parties, graduation, and his first grandson's birthday because of his busy schedule, and his son told him to remove his number from his contacts.
• The pilot said his daughter sent a similar text two weeks later, and he told the father, "I have flown everywhere but obviously gone nowhere... you told me you're flying nowhere, but with your kids you're flying everywhere."

Details Worth Noting

• Concrete instructions: The video does not give step-by-step instructions, but the actionable example is to plan a simple, inexpensive outing that occupies children for several hours so a spouse can get uninterrupted time for holiday preparation, using a local attraction or transit ride.
• The Lakewood schools were closed three days before Pesach so that rebbeim could help their wives with holiday preparation.
• The father's drive to Newark Airport takes about an hour from Lakewood, and combined with the two-hour train ride and return trip, it filled the four-hour window.
• The AirTrain runs near the runway and over the Jersey Turnpike, which the speaker presents as part of why the outing was engaging for the children.
• The story is told as a personal anecdote and a moral illustration about family priorities, not as professional advice.

Bottom Line

Time spent with children matters more than professional achievements, and the story frames a simple shared outing as a way to show that commitment.