I grew up in Orlando but spent most of my summers in Montana. Bozeman is probably my favorite place on earth. Jerusalem is up there now, but if I had to pick somewhere that wasn't Israel, it would be Bozeman. I have an older brother and sister who are twins, Lauren and Ryan. We're a close-knit family and I truly have the best parents in the entire world.

Judaism was always an important part of our family, but it was more tradition than anything else. We'd light the Shabbat candles, then go watch a movie. We'd light the Chanukah candles and I wouldn't know what the Hebrew meant. I loved it because it was my family's tradition, but I never understood it. I would find any excuse not to go to synagogue.

In March of 2020, we were in Montana for spring break. Instead of going back to Florida when Covid hit, we stayed. I was twelve, almost thirteen and my Bar Mitzvah had been planned for that June in South Africa. My first thought was: great, I don't have to do my Bar Mitzvah.

My parents wanted me to continue Bar Mitzvah lessons in Bozeman so they scheduled online learning sessions with Rabbi Chaim. I remember thinking: another thing I don't want to do. Then I met him, and I can't even explain. It was incredible. He really listened. I read somewhere that the words listen and silent have the same letters. I think about that a lot. We learnd Chumash together and I felt like there was a depth I'd never experincd before. We started going to Chabad for the holidays, Purim, Chanukah, Sushi in the Sukkah. Whatver Rabbi Bruk and Chavie were doing, we went.

In September of 2020, a fire broke out and burned down our house. We evacuated, stayed with family and friends, and eventually went back to Florida. But I kept learning with Rabbi Bruk even from home. The following summer, we came back to Montana and had my Bar Mitzvah next to Bridger Creek, on my family's property. Just me, my mom, my dad, my brother, my sister, and Rabbi Bruk.

It was the first day I ever put on tefillin. I hadn't just memorized lines. I knew what I was saying and why. Not fully but it meant something. It was one of the most beautiful days of my life.

When I got back to Florida I got involved with Chabad in Orlando and started doing CTeen. I went to Shabbatons in New York City. I loved how Chabad says every Jew is a Jew. You can walk in knowing nothing and they meet you where you are.

Freshman year I started a Jewish Student Union at Edgewater High School and became president. I also built a math tutoring nonprofit that by graduation covered over eight schools and 500 students in Florida, and I joined the advisory board of a Holocaust education organization called Hate Ends Now. Around the same time I got into pickleball, started playing at Bogert Park in Bozeman and wondered why there wasn't a better app to connect players. So I launched PicklePalz. We're now live in the US, Canada, Israel, and India, partnered with DUPR, the biggest pickleball rating system in the world, and I'm working on raising the next round of funding.

But during this whole time, when I'd look at the world, or hiking in the mountains of Montana, I kept feeling this thing I couldn't explain. There has to be more. Everything is too perfect. It doesn't make sense. I’d think about this torch my family has carried for thousands of years and wonder, why are people still doing this? Now I’m holding that torch. What can I do to build that fire up instead of letting it go out?

By senior year I got into the University of Florida and into the University of Virginia. Then Olami offered an affordable trip to Israel. I saw "Trip to Israel” and signed up. I missed the word yeshiva somewhere in the description.

We get to the airport and they tell us we're going to Derech and Netiv. I had no idea what those were. They said: yeshivas. I said: what's a yeshiva? When I got to Or Sameach and met the rabbis and the students, I saw that the kids looked like me and dressed like me. They said: During high school we were exhausted, running from one thing to the next, we want a year to focus on ourselves. The only way we can be good to the world is if we're the best versions of ourselves first.

That night me and my friends, Mike and Zach, snuck up to the roof of our hotel in Jerusalem. We weren't supposed to be up there, and we just sat looking over the city. I knew I needed to come back here.

I came home and told my parents that I wanted to go to yeshiva. At first they were worried that I was throwing away everything I'd worked for. It was a reasonable freak-out. I understood it. But I sat with my decision for a long time. I wrote out everything that was important to me. My values. What I'd learned from my family. What I wanted to be when I grew up. Did I want to be the wealthiest person, or the person who did the most good?

I emailed UF and asked if I could defer. They said yes. I showed my parents. That's when the tears started. They realized I was actually going. They've always been supportive. It wasn't a no. It was more like, is our kid going to come back a rabbi? They knew how hard I worked to get into college. Honestly, I get it.

My friend, Zach said: obviously if you're going, I'm going. I know you felt what I felt. I came in with very little knowledge but the thing is about the Torah is that it's infinite. You realize pretty quickly that it's okay to know nothing, as long as you're willing to learn.

I'm not going to be learning Torah 24/7, that's not how I'm wired. I need to get out and engage with the world. I love the people I'm surrounded by, and I still have a long way to go. That's the truth.

Jason: I couldn't stand Hebrew school growing up. We were forced to go and I never understood why you'd do that to a kid. So when Adam didn’t like it, Ronni and I said, we're not doing this.

Ronni: Someone told us early on, get out of his way. And we did. That's been our approach with all of our kids. We've always had a hundred percent trust with them.

Jason: When Adam clicked with Rabbi Bruk, we weren't surprised. That's just Adam. If he has a passion for something he pursues it. rabbi Bruk even wrote about how Adam was the only kid who sutdied with him for a full year after his Bar Mitzvah.

Ronni: It's not like Judaism was new to our family. I've always been involved. My kids have seen me doing this their whole lives. We gave Adam the space to find it, but the foundation was always there.

Jason: When he told us he was thinking about yeshiva, the worry was he'd come back in a black hat and a white shirt and his future kids wouldn't be able to eat at our house. I go back and forth with it. Is he being pulled into something different? Yes. It may not be the path we chose but at the end of the day, what is he actually learning? To be a good human being.

Ronni: And he hasn't given anything up. He's still doing his pickleball business, still planning on his degreee. Maybe he's added to his life. That's what keeps us grounded. I mean, oook, hte way Json and I are wired i, hen something happens, you make it work. You don't sit in it. Jason got cancer in ay of 2014, and that November we got on a plane to Israel because the twins were having their Bar and Bat Mitzvahs and that was not getting cancelled. And then the fire. We lost the house, stayted with friends for a week, rented for two years, rebuilt on the same land. I'm not saying it wasn't hard. But our glass is always half full.

Jason: I never heard the word chavruta before Adam left. I didn't really know what tefillin was. Now I put them on every day, because of my son. He is finding such joy and peace in all of this that it would be difficult not to embrace it. Ronni and I are both Jewish. He wants to be more Jewish. How can we not support that?