Can you believe that a month has already passed since we stood at sunset at the Israel Museum? Tried to get one more glass of wine and keep the rocks out of our sandals. An entire month. I haven’t just been back for a few days from Israel, but well over two weeks.
So much has changed… or rather, nothing has changed. My expectations for how this month would end were completely wrong except that Harry Potter was indeed released and I was able to borrow one last time. Here I am, hineni, the same as I ever was.
Tomorrow is a month from Tuesday in Israel. The day I wound up crying over my kebabs on that porch/patio with a cyprus growing through the roof. I had been so incredibly lonely at ROI120. It is hard to explain, because in the end I made a few good friends. But I felt like such an outsider with my little program, no funding, no proposals for funding out, no connections to important Jews… and introverted.
I was overwhelmed by the “who are you and what important things do you do” conversations. I’m just a blogger in Chicago with a program for 8 people. We go to a coffee shop and talk about judaism. That’s all. No grants, no national infrastructure, no website. Not yet anyway.
I was very much at the end of my nerves, having a sad time at camp, I guess. The next ten days or so were magical. And now I’m still just where I was before I got on the plane. Hell, before before before before before…