Three months and two days since we landed on the moon. So much has happened since then, and all the events and thoughts that race between them during times when, seemingly, nothing is happening, keep changing form constantly, and are very difficult to capture in words. Still, I’m starting to try.

I would like to be able to focus on what has been built, on what has already been achieved. The significant accomplishments so far are mainly those of the children, I must note: three children in three different schools (elementary, middle, high school), each one a world with completely different rules, a different way of operating, and different goals from which various challenges arise. It’s beautiful and encouraging to see that despite the difficulties, they are managing to rebuild themselves and find themselves here again, while not forgetting where they came from and what they have in their bags, both here and there. It’s encouraging to see that they are very much themselves here, and how quickly they shine in the eyes of the educational staff and everyone they meet. They’re making connections with children from various places that, until recently, were only marked with frightening and distant names on maps.

I would like to write about the public education system here on the moon, a parallel universe where there are 18 children in a class (and sometimes fewer), three teachers, music, art, science, languages—everything. Even free lunches for everyone. I would like to bring here moving pictures from the early-year meetings at the schools and share in this experience, of our first encounters as parents with a foreign, new education system that emphasizes values I thought were the foundation of good education, no matter where, in a place where there is room for everyone, in action and not just on paper.

I know it’s not entirely like this and that it’s more complex and fragile than that, don’t worry. There is no euphoria, and I can’t do all of this. Not yet, maybe one day. Right now, it hurts, and it’s painful. Everything is still complex and unclear. Everything is mined. We make many mistakes here, I’m sure. And we will make more.

We are in great sorrow, encompassing us all the time, even on the good days. We’ve had some truly pleasant and peaceful days; ones we’ve already forgotten are a basic thing we all deserve. We’ve also had some painful encounters and met fewer flattering sides of American culture. We’ve realized that, well, we are really just a tiny pin on the world map, and most people couldn’t care less about the yellow bracelet on my wrist or the yellow pin on my shirt. Sometimes this indifference is better, this detachment, than the ignorance and aggression we see online. Fortunately, we haven’t encountered it face to face so far, and I hope it stays that way. We, for our part, as we committed back in October, are forging ahead until everyone returns, and we are finding the appropriate spaces for that here. There are some.

Instead of going silent in the face of pain and aggression, I want to give them a bit of space, hoping that by doing so, they can gradually become secondary characters, or at least cause less havoc. I know that not everything is in my hands, but still, I choose to look at them without shame and in the hope that I will feel justified, as much as I can, to express myself freely. This has become a complex task for me.

So, pain and aggression.

A lot of circles of pain, like atoms colliding randomly (and sometimes not), painful in themselves and causing pain to each other. And all these circles are contained within a large bag of silence, within which everything happens, on mute. What right do I have to feel pain? What does it even mean now? How can I even talk about difficulty, about mourning, about the loss of life as we knew it—when the events of the past year stand before us, and especially since the event has not yet ended, the kidnapped people are not yet home, we’re in a fog of uncertainty about the fate of over a hundred people, and the war is only becoming more complicated, there is no place free of danger, no place where we don’t need a bomb shelter in the country, and those holding the reins are just speeding ahead without thinking about life, about tomorrow, about what will happen the day after?

So, how can I mourn at home (and where is home?), how can I mourn for home, for myself, for not being there, for not being there now? For the choice I made to leave a house that was burning, when those in front of me couldn’t decide, who managed to escape with nothing, without even being able to think about it. And what about those who couldn’t escape?

As time passes, I realize I’m in circles of pain stemming from mourning. There is another mourning. I try not to measure emotions and pain with standard rulers, despite the temptation and despite my habit of doing so, sometimes I fail and then remind myself that now I am in a different scale, in units of measure that don’t exist in the country, and that pain in the country is measured in units of measure that cannot be measured in the world. I’m searching through my new ruler drawer in the new creative space I’ve set up here, so different from the one in the country, made up of pieces of land, of things I’m glad I brought and regret having brought at the same time, that sometimes they serve as an anchor and joy, and sometimes as a burden on my neck, filling me with regret for not leaving them in the country, because what do they have to do with this place, why did I impose this move on them, why couldn’t I let them go and leave them in their home?

I understand, with sorrow and acceptance, that here we need to be now. That’s the healthy thing for us to do, to allow the children lives of growth and opportunities that are not influenced by constant existential threats and the feeling that the contract is broken and no one will protect them except for us. I know not everyone shares this feeling, but this is how we feel. I assume this is very painful to read, especially if the thought of moving outside is present and not viable. And maybe not only. I understand that from the same events, people have learned different lessons, many of them opposite from one another, and I’m not trying to prove the righteousness of our path. Maybe we’re wrong, it’s always a possibility. Maybe we will regret it, perhaps. We took this into account, and still, we preferred to move this time, unlike the many times we considered and decided to stay.

I think that pain, and more than that—the need and desire for certainty, for control, and for approval (internal, external) for where to live and where to raise children—might be fertile ground for aggression. We are really hurting, and sometimes the only available and less painful outlet for this pain is aggression, toward ourselves, toward others. I say “aggression,” but I mean projection in the broader sense. I feel that when people feel the need for approval or recognition that their choice or reality is legitimate, and at the same time they are faced with someone who chose or could have chosen differently—there’s a mechanism that goes into attack mode, which is essentially self-defense of their lives. Sometimes I feel, and even before we left, this was very noticeable in interactions with both close and distant people—there’s a need for people to convince me that my choice is wrong, when in fact, people need to say to themselves out loud, to hear themselves explain why they chose differently, the opposite of me in this case. Even when everything was already settled, even in the sale of the yard at my house, just a few days before we left. Sadly, there were also many difficult farewells that ended on a very harsh, offensive, aggressive note. Even very close people, and even family. It’s painful, but it’s also very understandable, such a move abroad during this time evokes despair, anger, a sense of abandonment, insult, and more. We’ve been called many names and are still being called, and sometimes they don’t miss an opportunity to insult and compare us to various groups in the population, with whom we have absolutely nothing in common. All of this is happening, and I know it will continue to happen, and I accept it. It’s part of being here, being a breeding ground for aggression and pain that is not only ours. Of course, this doesn’t mean that everything here is embraced and accepted with love or joy, sometimes I also set boundaries, and despite understanding all this, I will not allow harm to us in a way that exceeds reasonable limits (what is a reasonable limit? Good question. Sometimes the limit shifts a bit, and sometimes it requires maintenance after it’s broken).

For me, there’s no final conclusion here, maybe just that we should try less to educate others and more to look at ourselves, that we should try to behave holistically and judge less, attack, and insult others for their choices, because we really have no idea what others are going through and what motivates them. Also, everything I’ve written here is a tiny bit, and there’s so much more that won’t be said here. There’s no moral of the story in this or in our decision, I have no recommendations, I’m not the expert. As mentioned, the pain and personal story of every Israeli right now is very specific. I feel like I’m navigating a flooded world, and I’m just sticking my head, up to my nose, out of the water. Whoever meets me now sees only the tip of the iceberg, even the new Israeli friends I’ve met here, and we’re all supposedly in the same boat. I don’t yet really feel like I’m in the boat, I’m in the water, peeking out of it a bit, not knowing when I’ll find dry land, where, or how to get there. And the water is very salty and stings, filled with tears, so much daily crying for almost 400 days, and we still don’t see the end, everything is sensitive and everything is triggering, and there’s still no skin, and all the burns haven’t yet received new skin over them.

I still go to bed every night with the kidnapped girls, with these young ones, that when I just see their faces before me, my heart breaks and I want to scream about what they are going through, what their families are going through in front of a world that is silent, ignorant, indifferent, and cruel. And also the families of the men, and everyone, and also those who have already returned and can’t really begin recovery until everyone is home. I refuse to accept the fact that there were toddlers in captivity, who left and are still waiting for their father to return. What kind of world is this?

And within all of this, I’m trying to understand what I’ll do here. What can I do that will help with the feeling of meaning, of life, what will be an answer to everything that’s left behind, and is there even such a thing? What will I be able to tell my grandmother, who I so wish could visit me here but can’t, and who knows when we’ll meet? What can a granddaughter who traveled far say to a grandmother born in this country that will bring her a bit of comfort in these days, when I’m here, and she’s there, learning to communicate through video calls at impossible time differences?

This is the mourning, the choice between grandma and children, between everything I knew and loved in life and everything that might be, between what I built with my own hands and what I might be able to build here. And the mourning is also about the understanding that not everything is possible, that I have to choose, and that the price, in any case, is heavy, heavy, heavy, there and here, and where is there, and where is here, and where am I?

And sorry if I’ve caused pain.

The picture was taken at the , Peabody Essex Museum,

in a moving exhibition titled, no less than:

On This Ground: Being and Belonging in America