Looking Ahead

Lately I've been thinking a great deal about the future. Its a fairly obvious topic for this time of year at HUC Jerusalem. We're in the home streatch here as purim has passed us by. In a little bit it will be Passover and before you know it its May and finals will hit us all like a ton of bricks. My classmates are all working on securing their summer jobs, finding new places to live, buying cars, and picking up their lives again from where they left off.

In a few short weeks people in my class will start their packing to head back to the United States and Canada. My reflection group will be having a discussion about 'What we will be packing with us' when we head home. I jokingly said to them: a very small backpack.

My last blog post was about the counter I have counting up on my facebook page. Well today I added a new counter: My Countdown to עליה! It say that from today I have 141 days until I make Ayliah. Writing that sent shivers down my spine. 141 days from now I will be here in Israel as a citizen.

Now I'm sure that most of my readers (all 5 or so of you) have talked to me about my plans, but I haven't really talked about exactly why I'm doing this. I've compilied a small list...

100 years ago Minneapolis Minnesota was a fairly large flour milling town on the Missisipi river. Milwaukee Wisconsin was a small little town on Lake Michigan. Tel Aviv didn't even exist! Haifa was a tiny port city that wasn't worth mentioning on most maps. Be'er Sheva wasn't a city at all! 100 years later and Tel Aviv is the cultural capital of a modern state. Haifa is a booming and diverse city and Be'er Sheva is the metropolis of the desert. I look at everything that's been built here and say to myself 'I want to be a part of this!'

Walk down the streets of Israel on Friday night and there is one thing you'll hear. 'Shabbat Shalom!' Saturday night its 'Shavuah Tov!' On Holidays its 'Chag Sameach!' Its hard not to live the Jewish calendar here. Life just marches to the beat of Judiasm's drum. I want to live here and feel that every year.

I'm looking ahead...not to packing for the United States, but to packing for my return trip...packing for my life.