I don't post or share every day, but every day of the last 293 days is etched on my heart, in my mind, and on my soul.
I am not one to be without words. (Yes, I know some of you are laughing right now.) Yet, for 193 days, I have had no words. No words. Only pictures.
Whether good or bad, my memories are tableaus, with pictures, scents, and emotions to accompany them.
My earliest memory of our family cradle in the southwest corner of our den, placed there for my baby brother. There is no picture of this, only confirmation from my parents that it was there.
I remember learning that my grandfather had died. My father and brother were are a school sports night. I ran to the school to get them.
I remember walking along 5th Ave with my family the winter before my bat mitzvah. We were enjoying the holiday windows and decorations. We wandered into Macy's, FAO Schwartz, and Lord & Taylor. It was in Lord & Taylor that we found some small bells and figurines that would become favors for my bat mitzvah guests.
I remember where I was when I heard John Lennon had been shot - standing in my bathroom getting ready for school; Imus in the Morning on the radio.
I remember my USY pilgrimage bus driving us from Ben Gurion Airport to the hills overlooking Jerusalem. We exited the bus to daven Mincha and get our first looks of that holy city. The memory comes with an overwhelming feeling. It is the feeling of gratefulness for being back in my homeland, as I sat on the ground and cried tears of overwhelming joy.
I remember the moments of joy and wonder as Sean and I married, as our children were born, as they reached milestones (not always smoothly). I remember job offers, buying our first and then our forever home.
And I remember the difficult moments. The personal ones - phone calls telling us other grandparents were gone. My father's deteriorating health. My mother's cancer and death and other illnesses and deaths of family and friends.
And the communal ones - crossing the Verrazano Bridge as the first plane hit the North Tower, the image of the smoke pouring from that tower tower will never fade.
And now, the face of each hostage, of each headline, of the testimonies and the responses, of chants on the streets of Toronto, of the pain in the voices of Jewish and allied students joins those memories. Each day is another layer.
So days pass without words, without posts, without reading and study, and sharing. This is the wall that defends of my heart, my mind, and my soul. It balances the my work, the thing that gives me hope. When I am home, I need the overwhelming noise to stop.
