Last week was my 300th post. The reaction to that milestone has been so affirming. Many of you requested that I sort the first 300 by topic and compile them into a book. I toy a lot with the idea of writing a book, but work and life keep getting in the way. I’ll keep trying, as I am honored by the support for a book of Marvin Blum Legacy Lessons. Thanks for the encouragement.
Hitting the 300-mark has put me in a reflective mood. Today, I am highlighting some of the most impactful posts, based on my own favorites and on metrics that track readership. We receive a bar graph that shows the number of readers, and some of the posts have shockingly high spikes.
As Julie Andrews sang in Do-Re-Mi, “Let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.” When The Blum Firm hit our 40th anniversary on October 1, 2020 (deep in the heart of COVID), I announced the launching of this Family Legacy Planning blog to commemorate it. We were all sheltering at home and couldn’t attend a reception, so I decided to have a “stay-at-home” celebration. Every Tuesday morning, your inbox would have a “Musing from Marvin” aimed at inspiring families in their journey to pass down a meaningful legacy. My early posts were full of practical tips, drawn from the best practices of successful families. First and foremost were tips for conducting the all-important family meeting. It branched from there into developing a family mission statement, creating a family governance structure, writing a “legacy letter” to your heirs, preserving family heritage, and lots of other practical “how-to-do-it’s.”
Those early posts were chock full of my best wisdom from 40+ years of law practice, but there was a missing ingredient in them – there was no “Marvin” in them. That changed on March 15, 2022, when I went out on a limb and told my own family heritage story: “I Am Ukrainian.” It featured my Zaidy, Eliezer Weinstock, and told of my four grandparents’ escape from Hitler. I shared that I chose the name Zaidy (Yiddish for grandfather) as my grandpa name, honoring the memory of my Zaidy. He endured unspeakable hardship in Czarist Russia (including having an eye poked out in a pogrom against Jews) yet miraculously made it to America where he remained steadfastly committed to his Jewish faith. The feedback was so enthusiastic. Readers wanted more “Marvin” stories in my posts.
In my efforts to inspire legacy, I never imagined that this blog would become so autobiographical. I also never imagined that I’d find enough personal stories from the recesses of my memory to keep this weekly blog going for now almost six years. I now live with a heightened probing into my life experiences, and somehow the well hasn’t yet run dry. My aim is to connect each story to a legacy lesson. From that Zaidy post on, the tone of this blog has turned deeply personal, and you’ve rewarded me with wonderful affirmation.
In an attempt to categorize my posts, I see so many that speak to raising caring and productive kids, preserving family heritage, weathering storms, and celebrating relationships. More than anything, at this point in my life, I care about relationships. It’s the first prong of the Blum Family Mission Statement. To that end, I often feature my deep love for family and friends—my wife Laurie, kids Adam and Lizzy and their families, best friend Talmage Boston, law school “Canoe Brothers,” and most recently, memorializing my recently deceased dear mother Elsie, the matriarch of our family. Many of those posts generated out-sized popularity, such as “Matchmaker, Matchmaker, Make Me a Match,” “Choose the Right Spouse: That’s What Friends Are For,” and “When in Doubt, Go! It Saved Talmage’s Life.”
Which post is my all-time favorite? That’s hard—almost like asking me to choose a favorite of my six (soon to be seven) grandkids. I have a strong personal connection to my five-part series describing the highs and lows of our visit to Israel during the week leading up to the October 7 attack on Israel (posts from October 10 through November 9, 2023). But if I must narrow it down to one, I’ll go with “How a Jukebox Paid for My Bar Mitzvah.” That post reveals my humble and hard-working upbringing, which informs much of who I am today, and the values of faith, family, and hard work instilled in me by my parents.
Now for the BIG REVEAL. Out of all 300 posts, which is the one that generated the most readers? By a long shot, the sky-high spike on the bar graph goes to “Getting Real: My Daughter’s Sobriety Journey.” Lizzy encourages me to tell the story of her battle with alcohol addiction. We are grateful that she is now more than five years sober. Perhaps the biggest reward from this blog comes from those who have read my numerous posts about Lizzy’s struggle and found the courage to address their own addiction. Almost every family faces this issue in some way or another. Thank you, Lizzy, for your vulnerability and transparency. You are saving lives.
So now I move on to the next batch of posts. Do I have another 300 in me? Time will tell. I’ll keep at it till I run out of juice.
Thanks to all of you for joining me on this journey to build a meaningful legacy, and pass it down L’dor Vador, from generation to generation.
Marvin E. Blum
The post that changed the whole tone of Marvin Blum’s blog, featuring the heart wrenching story of Marvin’s Zaidy, Eliezer Weinstock, in “I Am Ukrainian.” Thereafter, the blog focused heavily on Marvin’s personal stories.
The post that is Marvin’s personal favorite: “How a Jukebox Paid for My Bar Mitzvah,” featuring Bar Mitzvah boy Marvin at age 13 in 1967.
The post with the most readers (by far) out of all 300: “Getting Real: My Daughter’s Sobriety Journey,” featuring Marvin Blum’s daughter Lizzy Savetsky and her battle overcoming alcohol addiction.