Home Is Where The Heart Is?

"My heart is in the east, and I in the uttermost west" wrote Yehuda Halevi in the 12th century. I however am neither here nor there, and would love someone to help me find where my heart is...

This weird situation of being dislocated has thrown us all into a little bit of a spin. In a family this manifests itself in higher sensitivities, lower sense of tolerance mix that up with lack of structure to the day (trying to squeeze in an email or two where possible, kids catching up on some class work) the sense of confusion is great, not helped by lack of clarity as to our return date.

We are home. This is where we belong. We all know that, even Poppy who has now spent more of her lifetime in the US than anywhere else. This is where we are coming back to, where we will have Friday nights with Granny Nola, Grampsy Maxi and the Gilats, and yet for now, it just isn't.
This past week has highlighted for all of us how much we have worked at, and succeeded in, building a life for ourselves in NYC, in creating a home.

According to the dictionary the definition of home is one's place of residence, the social unit formed by a family living together, a familiar or usual setting; congenial environment; the focus of one's domestic attention, home is where the heart is, a place of origin, one's own country. These definitions as far as we are concerned refer both to NY and to Israel for now, and hence the confusion.

In a funny kind of way we have been exiled from our home to our home. We are "forced" to be here not from choice, and we resent that. While we love being here, for now we belong to a different home and we hope to return there soon, and in time, and when planned we will also return here.

Life's Funny Twists & Turns

Catamount Trail Map

As in Ski so in life... knowing how to carve out turns, jump at just the right moment, and occasionally choosing free style or proper form are key. You might think that this is all because of Sochi. But no. It is because this past weekend we were supposed to be skiing in Copake New York. Our lovely friendship with our neighbors would have taken another step as we would join them for Presidents day long weekend in the house they rented in upstate NY. Kids had new snow boots, Nomi had her free snow pass (they give them to 4th & 5th graders...), and I had a book! Then came the call.
Instead of freestyle skiing down the green trail, life took a twist and we found ourselves full speed down the black trail.

Thanks to the Jewish Agency mishandling our US visas, we booked tickets, packed bags and were on flights Israel bound all within less than 24 hours.

Here are some views from the trail -

Flight NYC-Toronto

On the flight Poppy kept asking me every time a flight attendant walked past- "is this the driver of the plane?", as we were walking off the airplane we saw the pilot, so I said - "here is the driver" and he invited us into the cockpit, and Poppy & Tomer to sit in the pilot seat.

The ceiling in Toronto airport was particularly pretty.

The kids are keen to write about our experiences since we arrived. I give them one more day in ski school, if they aren't independent by tomorrow, I swoop in and publish for them :-)
At least on this slope I can be a skilled skier, more than I could say had I ended up on the slopes of Catamount.