The Right to Choose -- Without Undo Pressure

Yom rishon, 6 Shevat 5772.

This post is dedicated to friends stranded in Chu"l who feel that people already in Israel "just don't get it" in the sensitivity department sometimes.  Note to friends already blessed to be here: Let 'em breathe, okay?  As our rav's rav used to say:  "A decision is a lonely place."

My Mama used to quote a famous old Western bit of folk wisdom:  "Never judge a man until you've walked a mile in his moccasins."

I am very grateful that Hashem finally (FINALLY!) said "yes" to my request to live in Israel.  I hope, daily, that He will not retract this great gift.  I pray, daily, that He will bring Home all of my holy brothers and sisters who want to be here.

When I first fell in love with Israel, back in 1991, I knew that this is where I wanted to spend the rest of my life.  Sort of the way I felt when I fell in love with the Dearly Beloved.

He brought me here for my first visit.  It was his third.  Nowhere else had ever felt this much like home.  I told him, "Go back and get the kids.  I'll wait here for you."

Ruti at the Kotel, when it was a bit more open.

At Yaacov Agam's famous "Fire and Water" fountain in Dizengoff Square.

Of course, it didn't work out quite that way.  It took 16 years for us to actually take up residence in Israel.

In the interim, I visited whenever I could.  (I have a very tolerant husband.)  Hashem engineered a job for me, with a boss who allowed me to make a business trip to Israel once a year.  (It helps to find an employer who has made aliyah, or is at least sympathetic to the idea.)

The visits were wonderful.  Leaving was increasingly painful each time.  Almost no one could understand what it felt like to be in my shoes, because each of us has a different story.

I stayed with friends during those visits -- and, baruch Hashem, with an increasing number of friends as the years progressed.  One early morning at the home of new friends, I davened quietly in the kitchen, as I waited for the household to awaken.  I gazed out over the red rooftops, and prayed a fervent prayer that Hashem would one day allow me this view on a daily basis.

Thank You, G-d.  He has!

A young woman joined me, and introduced herself as my hosts' eldest daughter.  We had a very pleasant chat about life in Israel, about my desire to be here, about her plans for the future.  Suddenly she asked me, "When are you making aliyah?"

Since I had shared a lot about my deep longing for the land, I knew that she could see that I was dedicated to getting here, if only...

"When Hashem says 'yes,' I'll be here," I sighed wistfully, knowing she would understand.

Instead, she looked at me with that gentle smirk that only the young can pull off convincingly.  "Oh, if you really wanted to be here, you'd be here already."

What followed is what my husband would call a Cylon moment.  Cylons (if you have not been glued to your TV set through the various iterations of Battlestar Galactica from 1978 until yesterday) are evil robots who, when they want to reduce you to dust with their laser weapons, first home in on you with a red beam from the region we call "eyes."  Once you see that little red light begin to glow, it pays to be light years out of the area before it locks on target.

Uh-ohhhh...

When a teacher or parent or coach gets very, very quiet, but you know they are angry and may explode all over your simpering excuse, this is a Cylon moment.

Skkkkkkkrrrrrrcccccchhhhhhhh!!!

I got very, very quiet.  The little light thingee behind my glasses started to warm up.  My response was barely audible, if somewhat clipped.  "Ah.  I suppose it's okay with you if I walk away from my significant debt, and leave my indigent and ill mother as a ward of the State."

She also got very quiet and reflective.  To her credit, she said, "Maybe I'll rethink my position."

(I really liked her a lot after that.  It takes a lot of courage to say the right thing in the face of the Cylon eye.)

I desperately want all the Jews I love who want to be here to have the clarity and the freedom to come Home.  But I also want you to know that I hear your pain, because I remember it.

Whether it is a commitment such as a large debt you feel the honorable need to repay, a parent or a child you cannot leave, or a handicap (real or imagined) you have not yet seen a way to overcome -- I will try my very best never to harass you.  Because YOU are the only one (besides Hashem) who can know when you can come Home to Israel.

Instead, you have (and always have had) my heartfelt prayers that Hashem will clear your mind and your path.

I'll keep a light in the window, and the kettle on.

Follow your dreams.

Yom shishi, 3 Shevat 5772.

This post is in honor of old friends about to make aliyah, and those who recently arrived Home: Joani and Avrum, Miri and Adina, Moshe Shaul (and his parents), Karen and Shlomo, Yael and Yosef, and all those who are on their way.  Josh and Chana, we miss you.  Come Home soon.

We were not sure how we would "make it" financially in Israel.

Our kids were not so sure they would find friends, or if they would figure out how to define themselves outside of the social safety and familiarity of their hometown in Baltimore.

Frankly, none of us knew what we were going to be when we grew up, because moving to a new country completely changed the playing field for each and every one of us.

We have chosen to live simply.  That has helped with the finances.  But self-definition is a critical thing, if one is to look in the mirror at himself each day and say, "Hey, good lookin'.  You ARE a success!"

Little did we know that G-d was going to give each of us the chance to be his most true self here in Israel.

I am writing, and besides raising crops of boys,  it's all I've ever wanted to do.  I play harmonica and percussion in a band with my husband, adding music each week to our home and our hearts.  I'm hosting soldiers and yeshiva bochrim in my home for Shabbat, surrounded by their love of life, of each other, and of G-d and His Holy Nation.

Stunt Man is "chai b'seret," living in a movie.  Whether jumping from planes or busking with his guitar in Ben Yehuda, he's living dreams he wouldn't have encountered in the same way in the Old Country.  And if you've known him most of his life, you know that his self-definition is getting kick-started in this first exciting reel.

Yeshiva Bochur has gone through changes in self-discovery he never could have encountered anywhere else.  So far, we like what we see, whether he's soldiering, arguing Torah with anyone who'll listen, or making music.  He is seeing in himself and the friends around him the potential to really matter, to make a real impact in his generation.

Sports Guy and his father, aka "Coach," are experiencing dreams they never would have imagined in the US.

The following film was made at then end of the last football season by Zevie Tannenbaum, one of the talented young people in this country who appears to be following his dream of making really well-put-together movies.  Look for #20, aka "Golden Shoes," to see Sports Guy among his friends and peers, his fellow gridiron warriors.  I'm just as proud of the Dearly Beloved, as he gives his boys loving guidance, and heart-felt kudos at the end of the game.


Ravens vs. Predators ~ Toilet Bowl from ZT Film on Vimeo.

Enjoy the new football season, boys.  Sweet dreams are made of this...

"There is a place for you here." *

Yom revi'i, 3 Cheshvan 5770.

We talk a lot about the need to re-invent yourself, in order for aliyah to be successful.

Certainly, there are people with great jobs in the States, to which they commute a few times a month.  That is one way to support one's life and family here in Israel.  And there are other people who land great jobs in their fields prior to making aliyah or once they get here.

But the vast majority of olim must "think outside the box."  For example, we have a friend named Ronda Israel who was a yeshiva administrator for six years.  When she made aliyah, she had to come up with another way to make a living.  The "Chocolate Dreams Company" was born.  (I have tasted this gourmet chocolate, and heartily recommend it!)  Ronda's attitude about making it in Israel inspired our thinking about financial survival after aliyah.

The Dearly Beloved has done many things in his life.  He worked in an auto manufacturing plant; he drove all over the East Coast making brochure deliveries.  He played college football and soccer, and even a little rugby.  He played guitar with several different kinds of bands over many years, sometimes for money, mostly for fun.  He spent 20 years in the US Army, leading men and dealing with "special" weapons.  (Don't you just love euphemism?  Like "friendly fire," special weapons are just as deadly as if we called them nuclear -- and just as nerve-rattling to be responsible for.)

And then he made aliyah.

We have a military pension, thank G-d and Avi's 20 years of service.  We are willing to live simply.  We satisfy ourselves with inexpensive entertainments.  We don't own a home or a car.  And none of the kids is planning on Columbia U or Harvard.  So we don't have to fly to America a few times a month, or spend hours and hours commuting to the city and working at a desk, to sustain our life here.  But we do need a bit of "odd-jobbing" to make ends more or less meet.

We found out rather accidentally that the Dearly Beloved is a remarkable guitar teacher.  Someone heard him playing at a kumsitz, and asked if he could teach guitar to her son.  He decided to give it a try.  And what has unfolded over the last several months has been a joy for me to watch.

My husband doesn't "do Hebrew."  He is not going to sit through hours of ulpan.  And yet, in order to teach some of his young students whose first language is not English, he has begun to teach himself some musical terms in Hebrew.

And because he is a gifted enough teacher to teach the student, rather than the curriculum, he has stretched beyond country and rock to teach himself various types of Jewish music, and even reggae and jazz!  Each of his students has a totally different and tailor-made instructor.  And he and they are having fun.


Let me share a secret with young marrieds everywhere:  one of the sweetest stages of marriage is yet to come.  Watching your spouse re-invent himself when the world expects him to go quietly into that good grandfather night is very cool.  It is eye-opening to see that your life's partner still has lots of life and learning in him.

And the wisdom to know when to rest.

  The Dearly Beloved pretends to take the news seriously.

* In 1991, we visited Rav Noah Weinberg, zt"l, and asked him for guidance about making a living in Israel.  This (the title of this post) is what he said to my husband; and now we know what he meant.  Everyone has to make his own place -- but it is here.