Location Location

Recently we had a post on raising good children which Baruch Hashem resonated with quite a few people, so I continue the thought.....

WHERE should we raise our children? The top three words in the real estate business are "location, location and location". In a city called Emanuel you can buy a nice house for 40-50 thousand dollars. In Yerushalayim for that money you can buy a parking spot... It is all about location.

It is also critical factor in raising children. The Rambam [Deyos 6/1] is clear that people are products of their environment, so it behooves us to make sure our kids grow up in a spiritually nurturing environment.

Nu - limyseh, where???

Let's start in Israel. Bnei Brak - that's frum!!:-) There are hundreds of kids off the derech there. Yerushalayim? The Old City? Loads of kids off the derech to varying degrees. Kibbutz Hazorea?? NOBODY is ON the derech there. So where? Tel Aviv?? Nahhhhhh. Raanana? The only American city bordered on all four sides by Israel. Well, not every kid there turns out so well either. Efrat? They have their mylos, but lots of problems too. Kiryat Sefer? Ditto.

Let's move to America!:-) Ahhhh - Lakewood, everybody in Lakewood has the purest best behaved children. Not really. Flatbush. Good and not so good. Passaic. Great community but far from ideal. What about places that start with "Wood" ["mere", "sburgh" "stock" etc.]? Well, if you are old enough you know that Woodstock is a great place for an "aliyah" but that would be through narcotics.
The other Woods are very comfortable and about 50 percent of my readers come from there but not all of those kids turn out so well either [others turn out grrreeeeeaaaaatttt:-)]. Manhattan? The "city that never sleeps", yes, but not because everybody is learning a mishmar....

So where yes? Alaska? Beijing? Moscow? Well, Chabad shlichim do it and their children usually come out great, but not for us.

Sweetest friends, of course it is important to find a place to live which will provide your kids with a nurturing environment, good friends, a solid education etc. etc. But, tachlis, there is no place without problems. Which of course brings us back to what we wrote in the previous post.

The answer is in tehillim. Say lots of tehillim:-).