I don't know. Very strange things tend to happen to me when I sleep.
Last year for example, when my wife was making our beds, she found a decapitated cockroach by the foot of the bed. How one decapitates a cockroach, yet alone at night in his sleep, with his feet, I don't know.
Just the other morning, she saw that my pillow had blood on it. It seems that in the middle of the night, for some strange reason my ear was bleeding.
I'm starting to get a feeling that I'm being kidnapped by aliens during the five hours of sleep I get. Which would explain why I'm always so very tired.
Alien lifeforms, as we know, are well-documented. Wookies, for example, we know for a fact lived a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. Klingons and Romulans we also know from documentaries on the history of the future. Amazingly, they even know English. Yet, we have no evidence that Wookies, nor Klingons, nor Romulans kidnap human beings at night and probe them, leaving decapitated cockroaches as some sort of "Thanks for letting us probe you! Here's a gift!" gift. My theory is that I'm being kidnapped by those aliens that everybody seems to know exist but can't prove exist. I believe the FBI has some X-Files on them or something, if I remember correctly.
Either way, the good news is, without my wife looking, I picked out my new pillowcase (a first in our marriage, for reasons unknown), and I picked out one of the ones with cars, planes, and trains. I was hoping, as usual, that it would annoy her. Instead, she got a good laugh out of it.
Darn.
"When you go forth to battle against your enemies, and Hashem your God delivers them into your hands, and you carry away his captive…" (Devarim 21:10).
Rav Shimshon Pincus said that this pasuk can be taught not only regarding the concept of war in general, but also the war against the Yetzer Horah. From this pasuk, there are two lessons that can be learned, which are appropriate for this time of year.
The first is that concept of going out to war. Many start thinking around Elul, what they can do to prepare for Rosh Hashanah. They think and think and think. However, by the time Rosh Hashanah comes around, they have not yet entered the battle! Yes, one of the best ways to win a battle is with sound strategy. However, there are times where there is no time to make such a strategy. Sometimes, you need to jump in and fight. One tank commander, on October 7th, made such a decision. This 21-year-old woman ordered her crew to plug a hole on the border. There they sat and fought for hours, without strategy, holding off who knows how many terrorists and "innocent civilians accidentally" from entering Israel. Hundreds of off-duty or retired soldiers, including older generals, hopped into their cars and drove off into battle, under-armed and unprepared. But they went, and it was because of them, a bigger disaster was averted. Sometimes you need a plan, sometimes you don't. The key is to go and fight.
The second idea is based on the interesting language the Torah uses. Regarding, "and you carry away his captive," it doesn't say "a captive," rather "his captive," being the captive that the Yetzer Horah took from you! Think about something the Yetzer Horah captured from you that you want back. A person, for example, might realize that he has been wasting his time in the morning. Maybe a year ago, it wasn't so bad, but over the past few months, he's been getting distracted with this or that. So, he can work on this issue. It's something personal to him that he wants back badly. Therefore, he will be more likely to put in his 100 percent into this particular battle and see it through until he "saves his captive."
From here we have two ideas to help get us moving before Rosh Hashanah. Make the fight personal and go out and make the fight.
With that, I wish you all a wonderful Shabbos!