As part of our Thanksgiving 2025 getaway we visited the historic Covered Bridge in Jay NY, built in 1857. It’s a beautiful spot. On one side of the bridge the cragged rocks and descent create a roaring rapids, and just past the bridge the waters flow briskly but more calmly. And all around there are gorgeous mountains rising in various degrees of distance.
And as Baal Shem Tov taught us to learn meaningful life lessons in our service of G-d from all that we see and hear, we found lessons while visiting this bridge:
THE WINDOWS IN THE COVERED BRIDGE
Like most wooden covered bridges, the Covered Bridge at Jay (which is quite long as far as covered bridges go) is dark inside. There is dark wood everywhere, the floor boards, the walls and support trusses, and the beams and roof – all dark wood. It has a confined feel.
But there are cut-out windows along both sides of the bridge that open to the expanse of the outdoors, to gorgeous views of the churning river below, and the vistas of the mountains beyond.
It recalls the teaching of the Baal Shem Tov that each “Amen!” is a window out of the confines of our world, it opens up into the infinite beyond. Each mitzvah is a window! It is an opening, an opportunity! There’s also the Chassidic story we heard as Yeshiva students of the imprisoned Chassid in the jail over the marketplace, when the warden opened the cell window to let in the light and sounds of the marketplace below…
The windows on the Covered Bridge at Jay demonstrated the juxtaposition of finite and infinite that is at the heart of Chabad Chassidic teaching. We may live in a finite world, and we must reckon with that, but our hearts are open to opening up to and allowing the infinite into our lives.
WATER BEFORE THE BRIDGE, AND THE WATER AFTER
It so happens that the style of the water of the AuSable River (which winds it way throughout many parts of this area of the Adirondacks) changes drastically at this bridge.
Looking out the windows on one side of the bridge the water is crashing down a short falls amidst large rocks, creating a churning rapids. But looking out the other side of the bridge the water flows briskly but much calmer as there are no rocks, the water runs deeper and less noisily.
This recalled for me a dream of the Mitteler Rebbe (Rebbe Dovber, the 2nd Rebbe of Chabad). In his dream he saw his father, the Alter Rebbe, flanked by two men. They came to a calm and serene stream and all three men crossed the stream on a plank of wood as a bridge. Next they came to a roaring raging fuming colorful rapids that also had a plank of wood across it. But only his father was able to cross at the rapids.
When he asked his father to explain the dream, the Alter Rebbe explained that the serene stream is the service of the righteous or the simple. No blockages, no challenges. The water is calm. But rapids are rapids because of the rocks which block the water, the obstacles build momentum and intensity as the water rushes round to overcome them. This is the service of the Baal Teshuvah, the Jew who struggles, the Jew who has challenges.
One of the prettiest images you see traveling around the Adirondacks are the many streams and creeks flowing between mountains and alongside roads, filled with jagged rocks, with water churning and pulsating around them. And in life, while it makes things harder, the challenges do add a depth and intensity, they make it richer, so much more alive!