In short
A first person account of the first two weeks of war in Israel: the disorientation, the return to ordinary work between sirens, the softening of a neighbourhood and the sense of living inside a story rather than beside it. It is a personal essay, not reportage.
Dear sweet friends,
Tomorrow is two weeks since the war started.
It has been a dazeeee.
On top of the war I was also moving apartments the same weekend it began. So my first days of war were dealing with all that, boxes, movers… and running to the shelter in between sirens and the other madness I was personally going through.
The first few days you are
OUT
.
Like completely offline.
At some point you come back. You open your computer again. You start answering messages. You start working again and doing life in between the sirens.
Some insights on these past two weeks for me.
The war outside brings out the war inside.
Judaism teaches that everything that exists on the collective is mirrored in the individual and vice versa, because the world is essentially
holographic
. And this war really brought up a lot for me — memories, things I still need to work through, things that live in the deepest and darkest recesses of my heart.
And through it all I am trying to stay in gratitude.
Gratitude
for what I
do
have.
Gratitude that I am safe.
Gratitude that I am not stuck in bombed Lebanon or anywhere my government is trying to kill me instead of protect me.
And grateful that I have a bomb shelter at home and I am not sleeping on the floor of the light rail station like MANY Israeli’s.
The daily vibe
Day to day right now feels a bit like COVID. Everything slows down. Completing small tasks becomes a big accomplishment. But you are also itching to get things done.
Everywhere this week I had to run to a bomb shelter — at the gym, at the hairdresser, everywhereeeee.
Neighbors start feeling like neighbors.
Humans are funny. Everyone softens and becomes sweeter. Neighbors I have never spoken to are suddenly the sweetest, when before they barely said hi in the elevator. Their kids are playing together downstairs.
A different vibe.
The power of community becomes very clear in moments like this.
For those of you who follow me on Instagram, you know I have an amazing group of girlfriends in Jaffa. We celebrated Purim together as this all started. I sometimes take it for granted, but having a community is INTEGRAL.
There is also something else about Israel that becomes very clear during times like this.
There is
no place like here
Israel is the only place in the world where people try to fly
back to the country
during war instead of running away from it.
The land of miracles.
Over
500 missiles and rockets
have been fired at Israel and
14 civilians have been killed
. Every single life is precious beyond words.
But if you think about the scale of what could have happened — each bomb weighing around
500kg
, capable of killing dozens of people — we could have easily had thousands of deaths.
And yet we did not.
I feel blessed to live here, to be part of this country, this story, and this moment in history.
Even though sometimes it feels like my life is a game of
Russian roulette
And at the same time, it feels like I am living a miracle.
SHABBAT SHALOMMMMM
Written by Yarin Weltsman (Queen Yarin)
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