I took all five of the boys to watch their brother play in
his last basketball game tonight with his 8th grade team. They were
playing against their fathers and it was a great game with a lot of laughs and
a nice break from the reality of our lives right now.
But the second we got back into the car for the seven minute
car ride home, reality smacked me in the face.
Those of you who know me know
that my life is filled with battling lions (fake ones), fighting off bad guys
(fake ones) and hanging from ceilings (real ones).
Tonight was an entirely different conversation. The kids
didn’t skip a beat. And by the end of the car ride I had tears streaming down
my face and I was trying to come up for air.
These were hot tears of desperation, of profound anger, of
anguish.
Why, oh, why should this be my children’s reality right now.
Why should this be what they know?
Here was our conversation. My thoughts are all in italics.
We enter the car.
Zeli (5): Why do the Arabs hate us?
Dear Gd, really? This is the first thing that comes out
of the mouth of my five year old? FIVE YEAR OLD.
Amichai: (9): Because we live here. Because we want to keep
living here.
Pause
Amichai: How did it happen? Like did the boys get grabbed at
school? Were they eating lunch when the Arabs came and got them?
The fear is so present – so pervasive. It can happen at
the lunch table, my son thinks. It can happen anywhere, anytime. How do I
reassure him, while being honest?
Zeli: I know what happened. (Remember he’s FIVE). An
Arab dressed like a Jew. He had a kippah and tzit tzit and he drove on the street
and picked them up. And then he didn’t let them go to their mommys.
Why, why, why does he know these details that we haven’t
shared with him? How do we make him feel safe?
Amichai: But where are they? How can they just be kept
somewhere? How can that happen?
Pause. The quiet of the car is permeated by my gulps, as I
try to hide my tears.
Amichai: I know what we need. We need some real superheroes.
We need superheroes to come and save our boys. That’s what we need.
Zeli: Yeah. That’s what we need.
And the car ride ends.
The challenges of living in Israel are profound. They are the challenges of being a Jew. You and they will get through this, stronger, more sensitive, hopefully better people. That is what all of us must do. The famous saying is "There is nothing as whole as a broken heart." Hard to understand, but true anyway.
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