LEARNING TO HEAR THE SIRENS.

This is what I know to be true in the world:
There is no greater feeling than love - receiving it, giving it, being in it.

We can't change people, unless they want to be changed.

It's normal, in this universe, for the sun to come up every day.

A cup of hot water, honey, lemon, and ginger can make a cold seem so much more bearable. 

And, a single moment can change everything.

I experienced my first rocket siren two nights ago.

I'm not sure if any of you have seen the movie "What the Bleep Do We Know?" but there is a specific scene where one scientist refers to Columbus arriving on the Caribbean shores and he says that none of the natives had the ability to see the ships even though they existed on the horizon, because they had no previous knowledge of flipper ships. It was only when the village shaman noticed very odd ripples in the sea, that he began to assume that there was something more there. After days of looking he saw the ships and then told his village so they were finally able to see them.  

When the siren went off I experienced this - this inability of senses to even detect something, because of never experiencing it before. I had literally just unmounted my bike after coming home from school, and I started making small talk with the people who own the restaurant across my street and all of a sudden the owner ran out and said, "At lo shamat?! You didn't hear?! Come here!" and he pushed me into his restaurant and told me to sit on the ground under the stairs and when I finally crouched down I heard the noise - this piercing sound I'd never heard before in my life.  

Everyone reacts to these moments differently. 

I was silent, and honestly, for once in my life not a thought ran through my head and when the sound ended we all got up.

One of the waiters was complaining about how the sandwich he'd finally made for himself got cold, and the owner was talking about his dissatisfaction with the government's policies for the past 20 years, and then the other waiter turned to me and said (in Hebrew), "Why did you even come here? You could go anywhere - Milan, London, Paris - why here?"  

I literally said nothing. I just couldn't speak. Ten minutes later I felt my body shaking. That was the extent of my reaction and I just continued doing exactly what I had planned to do all along. I went to my gym to pick up the headphones I lent my friend earlier and it wasn't until I was there in the mall where my gym is that I finally processed everything, because a large group of humans stood in the basement together some crying, some laughing, some talking. There was a grandfather with his grand daughter telling her a story to keep her there so they wouldn't have to go outside. There were so many couples holding each other. I felt like I was in a museum on one side of the glass and every one else was an exhibition. The only thing I did was call my neighbor and ask if we had a bomb shelter in the basement, and he laughed at me, and asked if I was afraid, and I said "No, but I need to know", and I don't think I was lying. 

So this is how it happened, and this is how I experienced my first siren, and everyone experienced it differently. And, at the end of the night I was happy to be with an old friend who could be with me so I wasn't alone. 

But in the back of my mind this is what remained: for every siren, there's a missile. And every missile has a story: A person who chooses to launch it (and maybe they're being launched at too) and a person or place that receives it, and lately, I'm much more concerned with that. What amount of pain, anger, education moves humans to feel that they have the right to control the destiny of another human? What amount of rockets, bombs, violence can create a society where that no longer matters? When did place become more powerful than peace? When did anger become more powerful than kindness, compassion, and connection? In my heart of hearts, all I wish for in this universe is a common understanding among humans that life is too precious, too sacred, to destroy.

Today, I woke up and the world didn't stop - because how can it? Love still feels the best, and people are still the same, and the sun still comes up every day, and hot water, honey, lemon, and ginger still feel good with a cold, but now I know what the sound of a siren is, so next time I'll hear it. 

themindisapowerfulthingtowaste.blogspot.com/learningtohearsirens

THE REALITY OF MOVEMENT.

My life is about movement. I do it. I study it. I’m fascinated with it. 

I think about why people move and how they pick where they’re going. I think about who gets to move and then I also think about who doesn’t. I think about why I don’t want to stop moving and why others never want to start. Mostly, I think about how movement shapes reality and how powerful that makes movement.

Two months ago, I left New York.

I woke up one day with the East River Parkway as my running track and the Empire State building in my background. In that world I was dating a lovely human in Harlem, and I wore nice clothes to an office every day, and I had amazing friends – the type of friends that would wake up at 3 am and find me if I was lost or if my keys were or if I felt alone, because the city is big and sometimes people feel alone.

In that world sitting in coffee shops and meeting strangers was my favorite past time, and I took subways and buses to get to where I needed to be (unless I elected to walk, which was usually the case), and I was happy, because for me, there’s no other choice in life than to be happy.

Two months later, I’m in Tel Aviv.

I woke up today and I biked to school and the boardwalk by the beach was my road and my background was a city with some buildings that look like they could collapse tomorrow and with others that look like they were built today. I fall in love at least twice a day and I’m learning to trust new people and I hope that they are the type of people who would wake up at 3 am, because I lose my keys a lot.

In this world meeting strangers is still my favorite past time. I do it everywhere. And biking has created an awareness of everything for me, because I’m not shielded from the world and the world’s not shielded from me, and I am happy, because that’s my choice.

My decision to move wasn’t an easy one. I could have picked numerous other realities, and that is my blessing – that’s my privilege! But this is the reality I chose for myself.

And lately I’ve been thinking a lot about life and location and how some of us can literally alter our realities based on where we live at any moment in time, but it’s a privilege only reserved for a select few, because there are plenty of people who dream of making a similar decision but never have the opportunity.

I think about my existence in terms of all the places I’ve been and I think of the different mes that would exist if I had just stayed put: one me would be floating around a broken New York City feeling more pain tangibly than I can right now at the site of hurricane damage; one me would be dancing on a beach in Ghana listening to reggae music; one me would be speaking in Turkish and enjoying black tea and clapping to the sound of a bağlama; and the last me would be sitting at the park I grew up going to in Colorado with my parents and brother and mountains and smiling humans.

I don’t dwell in all of those realities, I just think about them, because I’m living in the one I chose for myself, and I wish that everyone in the universe had the right and opportunity to share this freedom with me. I wish that everyone had the right to be who they are in the place they love most. Sometimes it's still so hard to believe that so many humans don't.

So for now, I am hoping to dedicate this reality to exploring more about movement...

and the power it has to shape reality.