When I was in tenth grade, I went through a rough period and often wrote poetry to express the intensity of my negative feelings.  It was cathartic and somehow, I was always able to find ways to express how unhappy I was or how bleak my outlook was.   I could even sound more miserable than I felt!

When I later met and became engaged to my husband, I felt so overwhelmed with happiness and gratitude, and I wanted to write some poetry.  But after writing just one mid length poem, I stopped.  Words just couldn’t express all the happiness in me, and everything I wrote seemed inadequate.

That’s how I feel about being in Israel.  I haven’t written about it because I just don’t have the words for how very, very right it feels to be here.  It’s not that it’s new and exciting.  It’s not that at all – life is amazingly normal, so much so that it feels like we’ve been here forever even though we’ve been here less than eight weeks.

When I’m here, at a very deep level I feel like I’m home.  And trying to express what it is that feels so good about being here leaves me totally inadequate – not only don’t I have the right words for it, I can’t put it even into inadequate words because it’s a feeling that eludes definition.

I walk down the streets, go on buses, into stores – and I constantly think how much I love it here.  I love the little things – the snippets of conversations with strangers, the blue skies, the happiness of everyone when it rains, the banks and government offices that close for Jewish holidays, the busy streets totally empty of cars on Yom Kippur, the sukkahs springing up everywhere, the people who have come here from all over the world, the willingness of strangers to be of help…..

I love my apartment, I love my neighborhood, I love all the parks around.  I love being close to shopping and public transportation, I love not needing to have a car.  I just love being here.

Sometimes I feel like pinching myself, that I’m living in the land of Israel, living in a place that our ancestors have dreamed of for thousands of years.  Are there challenges?  Well, life is life, so obviously there are!  But thinking of people who would have given anything to get here puts into perspective what we had to do in order to be here.  It wasn’t easy, but I’m so, so grateful to be here.

And even though words are totally inadequate, it’s a huge omission for me not to say anything.  So now I’ve said it. 😛

Avivah