(Jewish Group) A 13-year-old died by suicide. His mother borrows from a Jewish mourning ritual... [View all]

A 13-year-old died by suicide. His mother borrows from a Jewish mourning ritual to save the lives of strangers.

Shortly after her 13-year-old son Shahak’s death by suicide, Anat Feldman’s family, following a Jewish tradition, began collecting smooth stones to leave at his grave.


Courtesy of Feldman family

Then she began to paint the stones into vividly colorful ladybugs — because Shahak loved The Beatles, and a ladybug is a type of beetle.

At her kitchen table, Feldman has transformed about 100 stones into googly-eyed ladybugs which she, family and friends have left along walking paths and other places where people are likely to pick them up, in Israel and abroad.

On each of the ladybugs’ underbellies, she has painted a sun with an “S” at the center, for “Shahak.” Its five rays represent each member of the family: the son she lost, his two older brothers and her and her husband Doron.

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