My name was Audrey Cohen and on September 10th I was quite content. I was content in my Philly home with my low monthly mortgage. Content with my friends. Content to have close relationships with my family members. Content with my teaching job. Content with my future and my nice little 401 Ks. Content with my Judaism.
Yes, on September 10th I was content, secure and confident in myself as a mother, a daughter, a sister, a friend....a Jew. As I slept that night, I had no way of knowing my world as I knew it was about to come to a bitter sweet end.
No, I did not know a soul in the World Trade Center, but I believe, because I was taught, that when a hurricane happens is Florida, and I live in Philly, I am to ask myself: What is the message in it for me? We are all connected on this small fragile planet.
So, where was I on September 11th? That is a memory that will forever share a space in my mind with Kennedy being shot and Nixon resigning. I was in the hallway of my 7th grade classroom. The principal stopped me in the halls and said, "The strangest thing has just happened. A plane," she said, "just flew into the World Trade Center!"
A tear fell down my face. Then another.
Her eyes opened wide as she asked, "Did you have family in the world trade center?"
"No, but my kids are all in Israel," I said with the escape of several closely followed tears.
My principal was no longer stunned. Now she was angry. "The World Trade Center is in NEW YORK! I'm sorry I told you...." and off she went, down the hall as I went into my classroom and turned on the radio.
Although my principal could not see the bigger picture at that moment, more would be revealed. The truth would be known, and then not, covered up with lies and the misconceptions of good intentioned people trying to fit their square pegged humanistic philosophies into a round-holed barbaric insanity.
No one knew what to do. No one knew how to react. Our country turned to Bush for guidance. He told everyone to pray. I did. He asked all Americans to light candles at 7pm Friday evening. What a wonderful coincidence that it happened to be candle lighting time for Shabbat. And it was that Shabbos, is the glow of our nation's Shabbos candles, I knew what I must do.
With more tears, I said good-bye to my Philly home, my friends - ones that I have loved since kindergarten, my family, my teaching job, along with my dreams for a future secured with my nice little 401Ks.....and called the Aliya center to begin my move to Israel.
And here I am.
As I find myself saying good-by to the first half of my life as Audrey Cohen, I welcome with pride the opportunites that await me in my new life as Chana Cohen, Israeli citizen.
Today is Yom Haatzmaot, Israel Independence Day and the stores are all closed. Good thing I went shopping yesterday. I am very careful about what clothing I put on for shopping these days. All modesty is lost in Israel now.. Women, men and children
hold up their arms when asked by someone in uniform, and the search begins. No one gets mad. No one gets impatient, just as long as no one gets by. They stopped someone last Friday from entering the shuk. She wasn't arrested though, and still had the freedom that all Arabs share in Jerusalem these days, the freedom to chose just the right spot to blow herself up. And she did, just outside the shuk, ripping apart families for the sin of being Jewish.
My friend Julie called me Friday morning to see if I wanted to go to the shuk with her that afternoon. She explained to me that by 4:00 everything is so cheap it is almost free, so a lot of poor Jews and new immigrants do their last minute Shabbos shopping at that late hour. When I heard the news that afternoon I called my friend... and cried. I cried to hear she was safe. I cried because so many were not. I cried because I had so many Shabbos chores that kept me from being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But they did not keep Elana safe. Who is Elana? She was my age. And, like myself, she was a new immigrant just trying to learn Hebrew and get a job and make shabbos for her family. She did some last minute shopping on Friday.
She was not in class on Sunday. She will not be there again. I cried for Elana. I cried for my teacher who had the job of telling us about our classmate and then had to continue with the drill of verbs when her stomach must have felt as queasy as my own. I cried for our people and then, I got back to conjugating verbs.
Later that night, in a private session with HaShem, I asked Him, "What more can we do? What more can I do? How many more mitzvot must I keep?"
And He answered me through a friend who happened to call at that very minute. She invited herself over for shabbos for the upcoming weekend and it was over Friday night dinner she taught me this.
HaShem just wants us to be nice to each other. To love our Jewish-selves and our Jewish brothers and sisters. Before this craziness started here 18 months ago and the Palestinians started attacking us, we were attackng each other. Religious against non-religious, left against right, synagogues splitting because their members couldn't 'play nice together'...and the list goes on. It hurts a parent when their children fight. We, as a Jewish family, are dysfunctional. And even the most dysfunctional families stop fighting and ban together when they are under attack.
So, just maybe, HaShem had us stop fighting ourselves, and put us under attack by the world so we would band together. Cause we did. Thousands of Jews marched at Washington this week and are continuing to protest throughout the world. The world is closing in on us and we are banning together. HaShem's plan is working.
So I say, let's all challenge His plan one step further. Let's be nice to each other, talk nice to each other and do nice things for each other. If you know of a Jew in need, run to do the mitzvah.
All the presidents of the world are not powerful enough to stop the violence against the Jews, but we must believe our G-d is! And if He wants us to play nice, then we MUST.
Perhaps the world is like a mirror and they are only reflecting back to us how we treat our Jewish selves.
"David Ben Gurion is often quoted as having said: "What is important is not what the non-Jews say, but what the Jews do." And Einstein once wrote that "the way to get the respect of the world is to start respecting ourselves." Maybe they were on to something.
Today is Yom Haatzmaut, Israel Independence Day. I was invited to a picnic, but was advised to stay in. What does 'staying in' mean from my Jerusalem apartment?
It meant that last night I walked out onto my mirpeset (balcony) to see the most beautiful fireworks I have ever seen. It meant this morning, after I finished davening on my mirpeset, I got to watch our country's teenage boys and girls put on the best air show ever...right over my head. To tell you the truth, I am always proud to be an American, but today I am prouder to also be an Israeli.
The sun is still shinning and it makes me wish I had the guts to go to one of these picnics...but I'll just stay home. Which is very hard to do when the sun is shinning and birds are singing and cars are moving and Jerusalem breezes are blowing. It seems impossible for anything bad to happen on a day like this.
But then I remember feeling that way last Friday.
Hopefully, I will be writing to you again from my apartment in Jerusalem to tell you, as my sister puts it, The Real News.
L'hitraot
Chana Cohen