Another soldier fell in Lebanon. I know his loving mother

I can’t believe it. The tears won’t stop streaming.
Another precious soldier, dead.

This time, it’s not our neighbor, Ronel.
Ronel who fell in the Puma tragedy last June, along with six other young men.
The first-born to his doting parents, who radiated joy and light in his home, with twinkling eyes and a massive smile which his siblings adored.

Ronel who lifted everyone up around him, whose energy was endless and laughter infectious.

This time it’s Ohad.
The son of my baby’s childminder.
The youngest of four boys, with warm brown eyes, a gentle, kind smile and the biggest heart that you’ll meet. 

Ohad, whom I’ve heard about all year – the excitement when he’s back for a shabbat, the piles of laundry and the cooking, and then the worry and sleepless nights when he goes back up north.

Ohad, who fell in Lebanon, on Friday.

The pain feels so raw as it sits on my chest.
Struggling to believe that it could actually be true.
Imagining his wonderful mother, opening the door to the uniformed angels of death. Hearing her scream. Watching her tears.
The anguish of a mother, knowing she’ll never hug her son again.
How can I even comprehend it?

I just want to make it go away. To take away her pain.
To do something, anything to make things better.
But what can I do?
Turn back time?
Her son is gone and I can’t bring him back.

I watch my own son, sleeping peacefully in his bed.
He’s almost 7 years old.
He gives me sleepless nights too, but for other reasons.
How do I help him at school? Why is he acting out? Am I doing the right thing?
The love, the tears, the worry, the efforts that I pour into him – it’s all-consuming.
It takes everything to try and do it right, to raise him well. So that he can one day fly and succeed, so that when he is an adult, he’ll have all that he needs.

I dream of walking him down the wedding aisle, of watching him build his own home.

Just as the mothers of Ronel and Ohad once did. 

These heartbreaking thoughts are too much to bear.
The fear that my son, too, may not get to fly.
That all the investment, the exhaustion, the battles – it’s all for nothing.
That the dreams of his adulthood may end with a knock on the door. 

No one prepared me to raise my son surrounded by grieving mothers.
Looking into their eyes and seeing their pain.
Watching the fruits of their wombs torn away before they had ripened.

The despair and the crushed dreams, sowing seeds of doubt into my mind.
How do I work towards the future, as the future crumbles away for them? Leaving them to stumble in the abyss, clinging to the memories they hold.

Sometimes, there are no answers. And there are no choices either.
I have to continue, no matter what.

And so, tomorrow, I’ll fight with my son about the shoes he wears to school, I’ll make him a sandwich that he probably won’t eat, and then we’ll sit quietly together in the morning traffic.

And I’ll try to make the most of each moment together, and I’ll try to be everything that he needs me to be. 

Together, we’ll continue blindly into the future, not knowing what comes next.

And some days I’ll meet Ronel’s mum in the elevator. She’ll give me her beautiful smile, filled with steadfast faith, as Ronel’s beaming face looks at me from a chain around her neck. Then I’ll squeeze my son’s hand tighter and hold him even closer. 

And whenever she is ready, I’ll take my baby back to his beloved childminder. To the same doorway where her whole world shattered. 

She’ll take my baby and give him one of her hugs, and she’ll care for him just like she cared for her own.

And even though her baby is no longer here, and she has a gaping, bleeding hole in her heart.
I hope that she looks back on the years that she raised him, and is comforted by the life that she gave him.

Because between the cleaning, dentists, night-feeds and homework, and the cooking, bath times, school-dramas and coping, she gave him the perfect life. Filled with late-night cuddles, piping-hot cakes, cozy clean pajamas and a warm home where he felt so loved and safe.

He didn’t get nearly enough years, but the years that he got were so good – because in those two decades of life, she was his everything, and he was her all. 

And now she looks back, with blurry-teared vision.

And she knows, without a shadow of doubt, that the most precious thing that she has on this earth – is the time that she poured into raising her boy.