This week concluded the first chapter of my adult life, or the last chapter of my youth. Or neither. I’m starting to think there are no chapters. You just do shit, and then you go somewhere else and do different shit. But that doesn’t make for a good story, and since writing stories is my shtick, I have to hunt for narratives, white-out the dull parts, snip where cuts need to be made.
After two years selling wine, I quit my job. I’m writing this from the top floor of the Jerusalem Gold Hotel. From my window, I can see two sets of train tracks, but it’s Shabbat, so the trains aren’t running. After Birthright ends, I think I’d like to stay in Israel for a while: check out the Red Sea, pick up a skill or two (Hebrew, scuba diving, krav maga?).
I’m twenty-three, I’ve paid off my loans, and as far as I know, I haven’t gotten anyone pregnant yet. The world is my playground. My expensive, dangerous playground, but my playground nonetheless. For the past two years, I’ve sold wine. When the harvest rolls around in September, I think I might like to try making it.
Today our group toured the City of David. Thirty-six American taglit, two American supervisors, five Israeli soldiers, three Israeli students, one armed Israeli guard, and one Israeli tour guide waded through the aqueduct beneath Old Jerusalem. It’s 2700 years old, and not for the claustrophobic, the tall, or the broad. Fortunately, I’m only two of those three things, and enjoyed myself.
After toweling off our legs, we visited the Western Wall. I said a prayer (I still don’t speak Hebrew) and thought about my family, every one of them, one by one. I could visualize them more clearly here, get closer than usual at the Wall. You may not be religious, but there’s something about a place to which so many people attribute (and have attributed, for nearly three millenia) such emotional power.
As many do, I wrote a note and put it in the wall; I won’t tell you what it said.
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