A Haunted Home.

‘I am fully aware that my current home city of Be’er Sheva is not a ghost town and yet I still picture it that way in my head.

I feel far removed from it, since my group leaders pulled us up and out if it’s southern location last Wednesday night.

I miss Be’er Sheva. It has become home to me in my three months living and volunteering in the southern city.

Right now I realize how much I have taken things for granted there, how wonderful things were.

Right now I would give anything to have my blaring alarm clock force me out of my tiny twin bed to commute an hour to school.

To see the kids smiling again and back in school is at the top of my prayers.

I even miss my slow hot water finer for my showers, the rotten milk waiting for me in my fridge, and the tiring hours spent twice a week at Oulpan.

I miss everything that was normal just four days ago and all the things both good and bad that made Be’er Sheva home to me.

I just pray that the haunting cries of violence and rocket alarms will quiet and part for a new and clear sky to stretch over the skies of Israel.

I anxiously await another day like last week’s when I was just so happy to have a fulfilling day of school, a night of carefree movie watching with my boyfriend, a long stretch of writing at my worn Ikea desk that has begun to feel like my office and a group Shabbat to look forward to.

As of now, I hop from lobby to lobby on northern hotels. I write, I pray, I try to remember to breath and keep hoping for peace.