“You know, all their kids were born there, but they still feel very connected to the country.”

I’m coming back from a visit with a lovely, warm-hearted family who has been here for a long time. There’s so much in common between us, she and I are colleagues in the same profession, and our little girls are the same age. Now, they play together in the yard and roam the neighborhood freely, without worries. As I tell Omer about the events of the day, I realize that my “here” and “there” are completely confused—that I’m still talking about the “here” of now as if it’s the “there” of about a month ago.

I’m still a little afraid to write. I’m afraid to think, afraid to understand what’s happening, even though we’ve been preparing for this move for quite a while, we really haven’t spoken about it much aloud. It’s like being afraid to refer to a baby before it’s born, and now that it’s happened, I’m still scared to refer to it, here and in general. I’m afraid it will hurt or that I’ll be misunderstood in a way I don’t want, and I’m not even sure what it is exactly. There’s a lot of uncertainty in our lives right now, in everyone’s lives. How can anyone know anything?

I’ll try little by little, also here. This is how our life is now, in small bites, in a tentative understanding of where we are and how to live in America when, at heart, we are still in the country, and how to live in both, here and there, without letting guilt and worry take over. How will we feel at home in another place, and how will it feel good?

We want to believe it’s possible, while we are carefully weaving a new life tapestry from different materials and under conditions that are revealed along the way.

The air that enters when we breathe brings with it many more questions, many thoughts of types I’d already forgotten existed.

I’ll give all of these space within me and try to bring them outside when I feel I can.

Until then, sending cool and pleasant air.