Hi Estee and all my new soul mates, Just returned home last week after my extended stay in Tel Aviv. Whirlwind of time travel with the touchdown re-entry to the USA and motherhood. With all that we discovered and re-discovered about ourselves the inevitable question of who am I? returns. Just in time for Tisha BAv, I fasted and prayed and reflected. I discovered that I am one who has traveled back in time to my souls beginning and felt lost on the way home. Yet, I examined how lucky I am to have merited to be a part of this exclusive club called the Jewish people who have survived thousands of years in order to teach the world morality against all odds. Our ancestors existed for us to live in this very moment in time so we can teach the world the meaning of life through the sacrifices the Jewish people make to live the way Gd taught us. The honorable way that the IDF conducts itself in wartime is testament to our tradition of honor and respect. Whether the media accurately reports the news or not, we know that Israel follows a Jewish moral code like no other in world history. Dropping leaflets, making personal cell phone calls and disbanding missions altogether, sometimes at the peril of their own soldiers is the length that the IDF goes to protect civilians. I am one who feels a personal loss with every fallen soldier as if it were my own (yes, Chaim body, I know.) I am the Jew in the diaspora who longs to go back home to Israel. The one who feels comfortable singing Am Yisrol Chai because I know you will understand On another personal note, I would like to let you all know that I have tried to turn these feelings into action (Tov body, I know) How can we take our experience and use it to create Mitzvahs in our own community? Two concrete answers that I have developed for myself. First, the Tisha BAv commemoration had special meaning for me this year--yes, the first time I have ever noticed this holiday.I realized that the First and Second Temples fell because of disunity between the Jewish people. We are supposed to fast and learn from our mistakes. We are reminded to focus on sinat chinam--senseless hatred. We need to unify and come together--as the war with Hamas has taught us. We are one. Yet, in my personal life as many of you know, my mother and sister have refused to speak with me since my fathers funeral three years ago. I honestly dont know why or what happened. As you know, I merited to go on this trip years ago as a Madricha, but my father was ill. So I came now on his birthday a week after his third yerhtzeit. Karina sent a beautiful note about how she called her sister after a long time apart. Karina gave me the strength and support to call mine. I gave myself the deadline of sundown on Tisha BAv. With heartfelt strength and support from all of you, I apologized to my sister for whatever was hurting her and she accepted it. Thank you for all of the encouragement that you have given me to take action to make our experiences in Israel continue to live on through the action that we take each day.
Posted on: Tue, 12 Aug 2014 20:25:01 +0000
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