How Was Israel?
Everyone keeps asking me, “How was Israel?” and the answer is: it’s complicated. I love Israel. I love the food, the market, the fresh rosemary growing everywhere, the lemonade, Shabbat, Shabbat lunch and dinner, hummus . . . clearly you see a food theme. I miss the food tremendously.
The trip was filled with so many diverse and unique experiences. I don’t know how to break it all down. I can go day by day and break out what we did and what I loved about it. I can pick a handful of things and go in-depth about those things. Let me know if either of these appeals to you and I can get working on it
In the meantime, let’s chat about being in a place where you aren’t the minority. I enjoyed Friday afternoon - things closed early in preparation for Shabbat. It’s a lot easier to keep Shabbat and focus on what it means to you when everyone around you is doing the same thing. I understand that not everyone keeps Shabbat in Israel and not everyone is Jewish. There is something to be said for wishing the shopkeeper “Shabbat Shalom” on a Friday and having it feel “normal.” There isn’t the pressure of other things pulling you in a million directions and you can focus. It’s so easy for us to get caught up in our everyday busy lives that lighting the candles gets forgotten. I am only speaking for myself, and that’s happened to me more times than I can count. I haven’t missed candle lighting since I’ve been back.
I can tell you about our pre-Shabbat singing and dancing by the Kotel and experiencing the Kotel on a Friday night. We lit candles and we walked to our extensive Shabbat dinner that went on very late. The meals were all delicious, and the Shabbat meal had many courses, and they made it special for us. Shabbat is important, and it absolutely felt that way when we were in Israel. I miss Shabbat in Israel. It was a chance to be very present, and I am hoping to learn to be more present on my Shabbats at home.
Another important thing was the sisterhood of the group I traveled with to Israel and the sisterhood of the people we traveled with each day on the trip. Our bus was made up of us, Boston, Ft. Lauderdale, and Israel. We traveled with the same ladies each day, and while some of them made us crazy, most of us bonded in ways that are hard to put into words.
The ladies from Temple Sinai miss spending time together. We are meeting monthly for the next year, but we are also getting together in addition to that. We hosted an oneg last week and will continue to do things together at Temple Sinai and for Temple Sinai. When you travel together, you get the good, the bad, and the ugly. We were all of those things. We laughed, and, boy, was there crying. Through all of that, we love each other because we are a family now. They say you can’t pick your family, but I picked this one, and I am truly thankful for each one of them.
