A Call to Imagine Greater

Last week we were at a beautiful wedding filled with love, hope and energy. It brought me back to 14 years ago at this time. My husband had come to Israel to show support to friends and to show solidarity with the country that was bleeding from the Second Intifada. Returning to his hotel from the wedding of a friend’s brother, he called me in Maryland.

“We have to come,” he said. “I don’t even have words to describe the energy that was felt at this wedding. The comradery that the boys, all dressed in their army uniforms, showed to their friend getting married. There is something about the weddings here that you just can’t get anywhere else.”

I didn’t know what he was talking about, really. What could make one wedding embody so much more hope, energy and life than another?

It wasn’t until we made Aliyah in 2004 and I went to my first, fifth, tenth and twentieth weddings that I started to understand what it was that he had seen.

What he saw then, and what I saw recently, is exactly what life in Israel embodies for us. There is an electricity, a sizzling energy, an intensity about life here that I’ve never experienced anywhere else.

It’s important to understand as I describe such events that we had a wonderful, rich, fulfilling life in Maryland.

When we made Aliyah, we weren’t running from anything. And that, really, is the gift of the modern State of Israel. Rather than running from something – we were running to something. We weren’t trying to leave our lives behind, but rather to heighten our experience of life, of our Judaism, of our parenting, of our country and our lives.

And heighten we have.

I had wonderful possibilities in the States.

I couldn’t have imagined the greater possibilities that awaited me in Israel, since I was enjoying the choices that life had to offer in the States.

But the life that we have lived since our Aliyah has been beyond my wildest dreams, full of unique and wonderful experiences.

They include:

The chance to watch my 2^nd grade son receive his first siddur at the Kotel, the heartbeat of the Jewish people for centuries.

The chance to hear my children argue amongst themselves….in Hebrew.

The opportunity to take a Friday stroll along Derech Ha’avot (the Path of the Patriarchs), out our back door; the very same road that Avraham walked to the Akeida and that Jews used to travel to the Bet Hamikdash.

The chance to learn Torah with my boys, while they say things like, “Oh, that’s near Beit Shemesh, right?” or “Shiloh. I have a friend who lives there.”

The opportunity to send my older boys to a high school that focuses on the love of the Land; that takes them on weekly trips where they learn about the geology, geography, Tanach and archeology that relate to the paths they hike in their country.

My possibilities include asking the butcher which meat number is best for our Shabbat cholent and having every woman in the store weighing in with her suggestion.

They include planting trees in our garden, knowing that we are planting on holy ground and that we are adding a little piece of beauty to this special land.

My possibilities also include much more profound situations.

They include getting our son ready for his Tzav Rishon, his first appointment with the army where, with a mixture of trepidation and bursting pride, we will soon bring him to start his future as a soldier of our country.

They include crying each and every year at the Yom Ha’aztmaut fireworks. Yes, fireworks make me cry.

They include crying during Hatikvah, whether I’m listening to it before a child’s performance at school, during a community assembly or at the Hapoel Jerusalem basketball game. Because it is holy in each of these places, and just as meaningful in every one.

They include attending the funerals of our fallen soldiers; attending the shiva of a grieving family and feeling part of a much larger story.

They include delivering soup to the soldiers protecting our area late into the night and receiving their glorious smiles and thanks in return.

They include the understanding that we are not alone. We are not just parents raising kids, but a part of a chain of families that have come and struggled and loved in this Land (or yearned to return to it) for thousands of years. And of the chain that we are starting for those who will come after us for a thousand more years to come.

When I go to a wedding, here in Israel, and everyone takes that extra second to sing of Jerusalem, of the sadness that has befallen us and our people, I feel it in my bones. And then I dance with the bride, knowing that their union and my participation in witnessing it, are part of the building of Israel and of the future of our people here.

I never knew that so many tears could be shed in the course of a week; tears of happiness and poignancy for the little and big things I see and experience; tears of sorrow for situations that don’t even include me personally, but that include me in the larger context of the life that we are living.

And that, that is how I’ve come to imagine greater. Because my life in the States was great, but now it’s so much greater than anything that I could ever have imagined possible.

Click HERE for more information and to start you Aliyah journey today.

We look forward to welcoming you home!

* Last updated on May 23, 2024 *