In a month we are scheduled, please G-d, to take our two oldest grandchildren to Israel. We are leaving out of JFK and pre-avaeilus it would have been routine. Fly up in the morning, check in and leave on the noon flight. Saying kaddish, however, makes it a bit more complicated. We have to take a 6:30am flight so that I can get to New York in time to leave the airport, go to a minyan, return, check in and leave for Israel. For me it might be a bit hectic but doable. For my wife Marilyn it will be more problematic because she and my granddaughter Adina will be stuck with all the luggage at the airport waiting for me and my grandson to return and for El Al to open so that we can check in. The perfect solution would be a minyan at JFK. I checked the JFK shul web site and the JFK shul does not have scheduled minyanim. It is catch as catch can.

Even though we have a month before we leave for Israel I have been searching for a solution. And then on Friday my daughter-in-law Jen sent me a link to a new IPhone app called MinyanNow. It is a minyan specific “social media” type app which allows similarly situated individuals to communicate with each other for the purpose of arranging a minyan where none otherwise exists. I will have to try this app for my Israel departure and see if it works. Amazing!

Tomorrow I leave for Columbus for two days of meetings. I have traveled to Columbus quite often over the last few years. But this is the first time minyanim are a must for me. I have arranged my schedule around the minyan schedule. This included telling my client that I have a hard stop at 4pm on Tuesday, which is Shiva Asar B’Tammuz, so that I can make a return flight at 5:30. That flight will allow me to daven mincha maariv at home. Not something I explained to my client.