January 19th, 2025: Happy and Heartbroken
Today, Doron, Emily, and Romi are coming home.
Today is strange. I woke up every hour during the night. I’m not sure if it was because I was anticipating having to run to the staircase for shelter (the night before a ceasefire usually brings last efforts from our terrorist neighbors). Or maybe it was because I was anticipating news of the hostages. Or perhaps it was because there was a stabbing five minutes away from my apartment yesterday. Or it was because of my family in America – grieving the loss of a dear family friend this week and in the process of mentally preparing to lose my beloved grandma, who has been battling brutal stage 4 cancer for almost two years. Or maybe it was because of the small wound on my leg that made me sleep in pain for three days. Or maybe it was because of exams in grad school mixed with managing puclic relations for my incredible client in Israel.
Who Knows.
All I know is that it is remarkable that I can feel all of these things at once and still wake up and do my day. In the afternoon I walked past a Muslim man praying on his beautiful rug on the side of Allenby, an iconic main road in Tel Aviv. I turned the corner and watched a glowing mother breastfeeding on a bench outside an AMPM store, with a staff member hanging out beside her. I’m walking in sunshine in January. It’s 22 degrees. I’m happy, but I’m also heartbroken.
It’s strange to live this way.
That honestly describes it perfectly.
Happy but heartbroken.
I think I’m the happiest heartbroken person there is. I am grateful every day for the sun, for my health, and for Israel and my people here – who have become my lifeline and support system when my family is across the world from me. I find pockets of peace every day just by having my vision and being able to see and acknowledge everything around me – yet with the same eyes that see all of this beauty, my eyes, my 24-year-old eyes have seen dead bodies. They have seen dead Jews. They have seen sexual mutilation. They have seen bombs. They have seen air raids. They have seen destruction. They have seen fire. They have seen pain. They have seen families screaming for their loved ones who are only a mile inside the Gaza Strip. So close yet completely unreachable.
They have seen such atrocities that one should never have to see in a lifetime. It’s strange, I guess when I put it down on paper. Is the human mind capable of this duality? Is the human heart and gut capable of this duality? How can I wake up in the sun and love and health and then walk outside and see a poster of a hostage or wake up from a nightmare because of what my eyes have seen, and then move on with my day and genuinely be okay? No, not okay, like anxious the whole day and overthinking but still making do. Okay in the sense that I genuinely feel stronger than I have ever been in my mind, body and soul. Is it possible that living in such a tense environment has tricked me into thinking I am capable of anything? Or am I genuinely just stronger because of this experience and life here? Is this the “Israeli spirit” that everyone talks about? Or am I just screwed up? I don’t think I am, to be honest. Definitely PTSD here and there and a constant sense of awareness and a sensitivity to any noise consistently regardless of the country I’m in, and most nights I wake up at least twice BUT –
I am OK.
By tonight, I think Romi will be home. I don’t know for sure because I will never trust Hamas. I will never trust the word from them. Ever. So when I see proof that Romi is home, I will believe it. But this is crazy you know? Romi being home??? I hate to say that I never really thought I’d see the day. I prayed and prayed and worked to do what I could to share her story. I worked with Romi’s beautiful younger sister Darya, and we created a space and an audience for her to share Romi’s story and how this has impacted her and her family’s life. How a little sister knows her big sister is being captive by genocidal terrorists feels … strange and absurd.
Darya—strong, beautiful Darya. Darya is okay, you know? She’s “okay” too. Obviously, it’s different for her than for the average person, but a lot of your “average person” in Israel is affected by the hostages being taken. That’s the strangest part of this all. Even the families who are heartbroken have to find moments of happiness.
Anyway, this is my brain’s flow on one of my 10 minutes walked out of my day. Can you imagine I haven’t recorded all my thoughts like this? I should’ve been. The whole war, I should’ve been blogging, but I guess my occasional advocacy on Instagram and my actual work and professional life took the forefront, unfortunately (or fortunately). I believe moving forward, though, that this will be helpful for me and maybe others.
Takeaways from this word vomit:
1. I am happy but heartbroken and don’t know how it can be undone – but it’s not cynical or sad. It just is what it is.
2. Israel and the complexities that come with living here, living here in war, and assimilating to Israeli society are filled with paradoxes and strange emotions.
3. We are trading our beautiful angels’ lives for monsters, and it feels wrong, but Emily, Doron, and Romi are coming home. We can feel grateful for that while being disgusted at its circumstances. That’s life here.
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