Moving Forward by Sliding Backward

Once upon time, I began work on a light-hearted project related to aging. My goal was to moonwalk with family and friends in Israel and around the world for my 70th birthday. The heart of my endeavor was to be a short documentary celebrating dance, physical fitness, mental health, and community.

In fact, I didn’t begin filming that long ago. It only feels like an eternity.

September 5, 2023, when I started my work, belongs to another period of history, similar to the era before September 11, 2001 when al-Qaeda militants flew two hijacked jets into the World Trade Center, killing 2,977 people and themselves.

I used to live on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, maybe a 40-minute bike ride from the Twin Towers. The site now has new skyscrapers, a museum, and two reflecting pools that remember the victims and survivors of the September 11, 2001 terror attack. The new World Trade Center complex is a somber, inspiring place, one that recalls humankind’s cruelty and also stands as an example of what it means to rebuild and move forward.

Today I live in Tel Aviv, about an hour by car from Israel’s southern border. On the other side lies Gaza, now a smoldering wasteland. I cannot envision a time when the land of Hamas will be repaired and redeemed, let alone turned into a welcoming place for a visitor such as me. Yet, I must. The alternative is living in constant dread that the status quo will never change.

After Hamas’s invasion last October 7, I thought of cancelling my project. The idea of moonwalking in a documentary seemed trite, if not an insult to those who perished during the invasion and the others held captive by Hamas, not to mention the many thousands who have died on both sides of the fighting. 

A friend of mine encouraged me to keep at it. Art, he reminded me, is one way people cope with trauma and tragedy. 

After World War II, the Swiss sculptor Alberto Giocometti created tall, emaciated figures that resemble survivors of Auschwitz and Hiroshima. Giacometti’s bronze sculptures, representing the most famous and revered part of his work, are both nightmarish and exquisitely beautiful. 

My documentary morphed into something else after October 7. It is now a feature-length movie, as yet unfinished, that explores the hellish year I worked on my moonwalk, trying as hard as I could to age gracefully in the face of war.

With less than three weeks before I turn 70, I am looking forward to my upcoming birthday more than any other in my life. On that day, family members and friends will join me in the heart of Tel Aviv to moonwalk for the final scene of my documentary.

We had a rehearsal with a professional choreographer recently. She has created a short piece for us to perform that features the moonwalk Our group ranged in age from four months to 70+. I thought we looked grand, not because we could slide and spin like Michael Jackson, but because we were all there, together, trying our best to keep the horrors of war from dragging us down.

It is not easy to perform a moonwalk smoothly. Timing and balance are everything. To pull it off, one must slide backwards. The more I think about it, the more I believe the step suits Israel’s moment in history. 

If we are going to find a solution to the madness of our war with Hamas, we’ll need to move back in time to when there was concrete hope for peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Some may argue that such a time never existed, but I believe there were moments, at least, when things looked brighter. 

On my birthday, when friends and family join together to moonwalk with me, I will envision our sliding backward as a somber, exquisitely beautiful way to move forward toward reconstruction and renewal.