It is an old story and, as far as I'm able to uncover, it has been told anonymously through the centuries. It surely has a message for us on this Sabbath Succot.

Two men, both seriously ill, occupied the same hospital room. The difference was that one of them was allowed to sit up in bed for an hour each afternoon in order to help drain fluid from his lungs. That man's bed was adjacent to the room's only window.

The other man had to spend all of his time flat on his back. Doctor's orders! The men talked for hours on end; they spoke of their wives and their families, their homes, their jobs, their involvement in the military, where they had vacationed, and every other topic under the sun. But every afternoon when the man in the bed by the window could sit up he would pass the time by describing to his roommate all the things he could see outside the window.

The man in the other bed who was flat on his back began to live for those one-hour periods, where his world would be broadened and enlivened by all the activity and color of the scene beyond their room. The window overlooked a park with a lovely lake-ducks and swans played on the water while children sailed their model boats; young lovers walked arm-in-arm amidst flowers of every color of the rainbow. Grand old trees graced the landscape; the fine view of the city skyline could also be seen just in the distance.

As the man by the window described all of this in exquisite detail, the man on the other side of the room would close his eyes and imagine the picturesque scene. One warm afternoon the man by the window described a parade passing by, and although the other man couldn't hear the band, he could see it in his mind's eye as it was described to him.

That's when it happened; totally unexpectedly, a sinister thought entered the mind of the man who was flat on his back. Why should the other patient experience all of the pleasure of seeing everything while he himself never got to see anything? It just didn't seem fair. At first thought, the man felt ashamed, but as the days passed that he missed seeing more sights, his envy eroded into resentment and soon turned him quite sour. He began to brood, and found himself unable to sleep. A gnawing and unworthy idea presented itself more and more powerfully to him: his bed should be by that window!

Late one night, as he lay staring at the ceiling, the man by the window began to cough. It turned out he was choking on the fluid in his lungs. The other man watched in the dimly-lit room as the struggling patient by the window groped for the button to call for help. Listening from across the room, he never moved, never pushed his own button which would have brought the nurse running in. In less than five minutes the coughing and choking stopped and, along with that, the sound of breathing. Now there was only silence-deathly silence.

The following morning the day nurse arrived to bring water for their beds. When she found the lifeless body of the man by the window, she was saddened and called the hospital attendants to taken him away. As soon as it seemed appropriate, the other man asked if he could be moved to the window. The nurse was happy to make the switch, and after making sure he was comfortable, she left him alone there. Slowly, painfully, he propped himself up on one elbow to take his first look at that world outside. Finally, he would have the joy of seeing it for himself. He strained to slowly turn to look out the window beside the bed, and discovered the window faced a blank wall!

The man asked the nurse what could have compelled his deceased roommate who described such wonderful things outside this window.

"Perhaps he just wanted to encourage you," said the nurse. "Or," continued the nurse, "perhaps he wanted to encourage himself."

"But he was lying," said the man in an accusatory tone of voice.

"He wasn't lying," said the nurse. "He was blind."

And so from this story we learn that blind people are necessarily those who can't see the outside world. Blind people see inside out. What's our excuse?

Too many of us are blind to what we have, aren't we? This Succot holiday comes to stir us and kick us in the pants, to help us toward a greater appreciation of blessings of life and of its beauty. We go through life as if we are self-made! Sometimes we are so very impressed with our power, our success, our ability to get all that is ours of the material sort, and yet the fact is, we are so reliant upon the next person.

Charles Plumb, a U.S. Naval Academy graduate, was a jet pilot over in Vietnam. After 75 combat missions, his plane was destroyed by a surface-to-air missile. Charles Plumb ejected and parachuted into enemy territory. He was captured and spent 6 horrible years in a Communist Vietnamese prison cell. But he survived that ordeal and now lectures on lessons learned from the experience.

One day, when Charles Plumb and his wife were sitting in a restaurant, there was a man at another table who suddenly came up and said,

"You're Charles Plumb! You flew jet fighters in Vietnam from the aircraft carrier, Kitty Hawk, didn't you? You were shot down!"

"How in the world did you know that?" asked Plumb.

"I know, because I packed your parachute," the man replied.

Plumb gasped in surprise and gratitude. The man pumped his hand and said, "I guess it worked!" And Charles Plumb assured him, "It sure did. If your chute hadn't worked, I wouldn't be here today."

Well, that night Charles Plumb couldn't sleep, thinking about that man. And Plumb says,

I kept wondering what he might have looked like in a Navy uniform: a white hat and bib in the back and bellbottom trousers. I wonder how many times I might have seen him and not even said, "Good morning," " How are you?" or anything because, you see, I was a fighter pilot, and he was just a sailor.

Plumb thought of the many hours the sailor had spent on a long wooden table in the bowels of the ship, carefully weaving the shrouds and folding the silks of each chute, holding in his hand each time the fate of someone he didn't know. Now, lecturing as he does before various groups, Charles Plumb poses this question to his audience, "Who's packing your parachute?"

We all have reason to be grateful, and yet too infrequently are. Succot is that precious time of the year which, with its fragrance of the booth and its colorful lulav and etrog, bestirs us toward gratitude and thanksgiving. It comes each year as an annual invitation to open our eyes to the beauty of our surroundings and to the magnitude of our personal harvest.
 

A man whispered,
"God, speak to me." And a meadowlark sang, but the man did not hear.
So the man yelled, "God speak to me." And the thunder rolled across the sky, but the man did not listen.
The man looked around and said, "God, let me see you." . . . and a star shined brightly, but the man did not notice.
And the man shouted, "God, show me a miracle!" And a life was born. But, the man did not know.
So the man cried out in despair, "Touch me, and let me know You are here." Whereupon God reached down and touched the man. But, the man brushed the butterfly away and walked on.

Don't be like that man who, finally securing his place at the window, was still too blind to "see" the magnificent vista that lay beyond his own self-engrossed and puny world. So give thanks unto the Lord for He is good, for His mercy endureth forever!