Guest Post: You Ask How I'm Doing
My wife, Randi, wrote this personal, heartfelt and poignant piece about how the war has affected her and our family. Though a tenuous ceasefire went into effect this morning which will hopefully solidify as the hours and days pass I felt her wonderfully written thoughts were worth sharing.
Eleven days since the start of this bizarre reality. Where do I begin? With OT me? With Yisrael's Mom? With Grandma who can't see her grandkids?
As much as I always look forward to summer vacation, it starts on June 30 at 1:30pm. No earlier and certainly no later. I had every work day left of the month meticulously planned out. I still needed to prepare my 2 classes for entering first grade. I only started a few sessions of this and not even with all the kids. I feel I have not done my job. That does not sit well with me. My kindergarten "graduates" had not had their end of the year party. How can they move on without properly ending a significant year in their lives? However, the staff in my school made sure this did happen while following Home Front Command guidelines. That did risk exposure to potential harm just driving from my house to the kindergarten. A ten minute ride each way with my heart beating a tad faster than normal. An hour and a half party with just over the maximum number of 30 permitted. At least if there were a siren, every child was with her mother and not my responsibility. The parties (I had two on two separate days) were beautiful and quite moving and fortunately went off without a siren. But that's it. I don't get closure to my work with 24 kids this year. I'll write reports but will we sit with parents to share information and recommendations? We don't know yet. I guess my summer vacation began early but it's not yet fun.
Of course Yisrael's school and programming came to an immediate halt. A Yachad Shabbaton he was supposed to go to on June 13 was obviously canceled. Our anniversary Shabbat was shared with our 18 year old. We spent parts of that Shabbat in the safe room. Other parts were spent wondering how far from home we could walk and still get back during a siren. My food was yummy though. :)
Sunday, June 15th school still didn't open. Of course it didn't. From then on the days have blurred. Zooms from school and organizations for kids with special needs. This helps Yisrael a lot. It gives him structure if you can call it that. Everyone is bleary eyed and sleep deprived from the middle of the night sirens. Attempting to grocery shop in between sirens is stressful yet satisfying when you accomplish it! It's like you won the marathon. Midday sirens are plentiful too. Obsessively on our phones updating, learning where direct hits were. Devastated over the devastation. Feeling incredibly proud of our boys and girls in the sky as well as on the ground. So many emotions in the course of a moment.
Hourly Yisrael talks about his birthday in Yachad camp. And hourly I tell him we don't know if it will open because of the sirens. At least his camp doesn't begin until July 24th. Maybe, just maybe he will go.
Disappointments abound on both sides of the ocean. Michael's whirlwind US trip to visit family and friends was cancelled. He didn't get to see our aunts, my siblings, our kids or go to a wedding. My kids here had an eagerly anticipated trip to Greece cancelled this week. Meira's university graduation was postponed and I have no idea when we'll feel secure enough to have a visit with the Modiin kids. My Atlanta kids were looking forward to a pre-Bar Mitzva trip to Israel visiting two sets of grandparents. That won't happen at this time. Every family I know is experiencing one disappointment or another. Family members stranded outside of Israel are strategically navigating transportation home. Many at high financial cost. One parent is home with a houseful of unoccupied kids while the other can't get back soon enough.
The geopolitical piece of this? I sit back and watch it unfold. No one is asking my opinion. Well, no high level elected official at least. The emotional piece of this? We have more stress, fear and anxiety on an already overtaxed, emotionally fragile country. Personally? I have my ups and downs. I do what I do naturally: stress cooking. Fortunately my neighbors humor me and continue to buy my food. So the next day, I cook and bake again. We are honored to have a group of soldiers based in our community who are loving homemade food. I do my best to sign up along with dozens of others to keep them well fed. Unfortunately the financial piece of this for many citizens is devastating. People who have already taken financial hits since October 7th are hurting even more with closures and no tourism. My heart aches for them. I just want to go out and enjoy our beautiful country. But we are essentially shut down. Restaurants are take-out only. Beaches are closed. The Old City of Jerusalem and the Kotel are closed. Only "essential workers" go out to work.
We clearly don't know what's next and when. Deep down I know I'm not the only one who hoped this would end in a day or two and we could move on with our summer plans. After all, that's what happened last time we got involved with Iran! But clearly this is different. Bigger. Hopefully changing the world for the better.
For now, I make sure there's plenty of Ben and Jerry's in the freezer. Just like I did during Covid. Just like I did after October 7th. And it's clear I'm not alone as the freezer section of our local store has been depleted.
You ask what you can do? There's really not much is there? Reaching out regularly helps so much. Just knowing we are thought of and cared about lifts our spirits. A good Shabbos on Friday, an emoji in the middle of the week. A prayer or two. We feel it all. So thank you.