It was a mild September day and school had let out for the day. I had entered a very new charter school, which was located in downtown Pittsburgh which I was enjoying. One of my friends, Lenard was walking down one of the wide streets just enjoying ourselves. I then started walking slower because I was undertaking one of the most influential experiences in my life. As I walked down that street with my friend I heard a voice in my head. "Become Jewish" was all I heard... a one or two second message that will later play one of the biggest parts in my left. After I had recieved the message in my head I was left with a sort of tingly feeling in my body. I said to Lenard "Lenard I should become Jewish." He said "What are you crazy." and I replied "No I am completly serious." Then Lenard ended that conversation by saying "You aren't going to become some damn Jew." At that point in my life and before that, I had never been anti-semetic, but some of my friends and relatives would make jokes about people of the Jewish faith. I kinda shrugged my shoulders at the idea of become Jewish. Well about a month later in the same school, we were learning about the middle east and the 3 major religions. In order to learn and understand the religions, each student in my class had to create a table with information about the religion that was randomly assigned to them. I had be randomly assigned to Judaism. After reading the paper on the Jewish religion, I knew that that was the religion for me. As I like to say, it "connects the dots of life." I was eager to start studying the religion in depth, so I did. It has been a year a little over a year now since I have started studying Judaism and I am now more then ever ready to convert to the orthodox sect. of Judaism. I plan on making aliyah to Israel (becoming a citizen of Israel). I can't wait till I step out of the mikvah as a Jew. If you have made it this far, thanks for reading my story. I thank HaShem (G-D) for all that he has blessed me with and for what I believe to be HaShem speaking to me on that September day. Baruch HaShem.

 Ahavas Yisrael (with love for Israel),
 Joe Lipinski

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