Leaving Israel

I don’t understand the way that some people are drawn to Israel.

I came here for a very explicit reason. I came here the same way people might go to India or the Australian Outback. I came to experience the divine. To delve into an understanding of the primeval force created by humanity to explain the ways of the natural world. But as my time here comes to a close, people keep asking me to stay, to become an Israeli citizen, to make Alyiah.

But I don’t understand how people can uproot their lives and move here. I felt that way some in Scotland, but not here. Here I feel lost and alone, here I feel the weight of history and the pressure of conflict – not the desire to raise a family here. In Vermont I feel the freedom to be everything I can be and everything I want to be. I feel the peace of the deep forest and the connection to the spiritual realm. Here, I feel the constriction of religion warring with the secular world. I feel the constant conflict between the Palestinians who lived here and the Israelis who the land was given to.

But in the past four months I have experienced beauty I could not imagine. I have experienced deep connections only found in the depths of the desert. I have met some incredible and spiritual people that have changed the way I think about myself and the world. I have seen and heard about acts of community goodness and interconnectedness the fill my life with hope and meaning. I have listened to stories of modern miracles and witnessed true kindness. There are connections between the people here that I can not imagine ever seeing at home.

None of this is really what separates my life at home from the past four months. I guess I don’t feel like I’ve been able to have deep theological discussions here. I did not meet any truly kindred spirits. The people around me saw one, unquestionable god, where I saw millions of highly questionable possibilities. I can never leave my reality in which everything is possible and nothing is true. As Dave Carter (musical partner of Tracy Grammer) once said “All of our songs are true stories. They might not all be factual stories, but they’re all true.” I have lived this way for most of my life – I have experienced the world as not always factual, but always true. I have believed in Mercedes Lackey’s “no one true way,” and through it I have learned to accept the differences of all the people in the world.

My ability to accept these differences has been challenged here. Challenged so fully and deeply every day. From the man in the shuk saying the there is “no such place as Palestine,” to the Rabbi who tells me “that’s a nice thought but it’s not what Jews believe,” to the people who so strongly believe in Torah that they can not accept other versions of history, to the people who are so opposed to the Orthodox Jews that they blame all of Israel’s problems on religion. I have felt more judgement here than any other time in my life.  It has not been a divine Judgement that says I am a bad person, but a very mortal judgement in which my way of life should be kept under-wraps and secret. I have met amazing people here who have to keep their entire life secret in ways that I could never imagine.

 

That does not mean there are things about Israel that I will not miss. I will miss the amazing beauty of the Old City. I will miss the view from my balcony, and the East-facing sunsets I have experienced there. I will miss the friends I have made here, and the way it is impossibly easy not to have a car. I have never experienced before a place where you can take a 5 hour trip at a moment’s notice without needing to rent (or own) a car. I will miss the markets and the freshness of the fruit. I will miss the girls I am living with.

As ready as I am to come home, I just now feel as though I am getting to know this city. I am starting to discover the hidden places that I want to know better, but I know I will also find them in Somerville.

Three days from now, I will be flying towards North America. I pray for the impossible, may this land, the space between Syria, Jordan, Egypt, and the Mediterranean Sea, Whatever name or names it may hold, find peace. And may I return to visit again.