In March, we traveled to Israel, Daniela’s first time to my childhood and her 4^th country. After the past stormy months with the devastation of losing my Abush and the light of welcoming Daniela, we needed some time as a family, all together. We also planned a memorial for Guy to celebrate his life in the place where he grew up and is loved by so many. The memorial was moving and difficult, and many thanks to all who attended. We had wanted to have the ceremony outside, in a little park full of trees between my grandfather’s house and his late brother, my dad’s uncle’s, house, a place where many generations of our family have played and walked. The weather did not cooperate. As we gathered to remember my dad, the sky opened on us. As we ran around trying to figure out what to do, I tried to remember that rain is a blessing in these parts of the world, but it was hard not to add my tears to the rain, and to feel that somehow we were crying together. In my deepest, saddest moment, I feared that Guy was disappointed in us, that he would have planned it to perfection. So many people came to honor Guy’s life that Zvi’s house was too small to shelter us from the rain. In the end, we all ended up at the community center, wet to the bone, but together, and it was a real testament to my dad that so many people fought the rain with us, and stayed, and we had a wonderful and difficult time sharing memories of Guy. I know that if he was able to see us somehow, from above, where I like to picture him watching us with a really great zoom lens, taking pictures, he would be happy to see everyone together. It was his favorite thing in the world, people he loved coming together.  A good friend of my dad reminded me how Abush would always tear up when he laughed, the joy spilling from his kind eyes, and that perhaps the rain is his thanks for our memories of him.

It is amazing to hear stories I have not heard about my dad. Learning new things about him feels like another moment together, a gift across time and space, the impossible desire to spend another little moment together, fulfilled somehow, for an instant, before the longing for a more familiar, “real” life interaction returns with its familiar ache. At the memorial, many people talked about the time that Neta was born, very pre-mature, and my parents’ strength at this time. I had not known that our family business, the self-decorated plastic plates that we sold to kindergartens across Israel, had started when my parents needed money for Neta’s treatments. I can empathize now at the despair a parent must feel to have a sick child, and as a parent, am even more amazed at my dad’s ability to pick up the pieces of a hard situation and make something productive, beautiful; a real mechanic of life he was, able to make things run again. I want to make something beautiful out of this situation. I try, here and there, to write, to keep in better touch, to do things I have always wanted, but it is hard, and somehow it seems to always fall short of the energy with which he lived his life; the way he was able to do so much in such a short time and love so many people throughout his journey. Lehaspik (a lose translation would be to accomplish a lot in a short time given to you) was his favorite word, and he hespiked so much. I know we have a tendency of glorifying those who have left us. Sure, he was not perfect, if nothing else, he had crooked teeth, but he was wonderful, as good as it gets, and somehow living to honor his memory is hard. The inadequacies of the living is a state I am learning to accept, because although life is a wonder, and I am ever more aware of how thankful we must be for every moment because it really is very fragile, it is exhausting to try to make the most of it all the time, and sometime one needs to just be sad, or have a normal day. And so, under the memory of our loved ones, we sometimes fall short of the expectations we project from them onto ourselves.

One of the hardest transitions of these past few months has been from the time at home with Daniela into being a working mother. I feel very lucky to be part of an organization that is supportive and flexible, I know that my conditions are better than most. Yet, the transition is hard. Motherhood for me has been a bit of a magic spell, a love potion of sorts, and it is hard to explain the enormous joy and awe that a day at home with Daniela and Pierre summons with such simple things like reading stories or tickling feet. My work is still very interesting. I work with some great people and we do some very creative things in our efforts to help vulnerable children, a cause I can relate to even more deeply as a parent. Perhaps the difficulty is in having one foot in the clouds and one on the ground; the going back and forth between these worlds every few hours is a long commute.

If I have learned anything about grief it is that it is not linear. The stages of grief make me laugh, and maybe that is a good thing since laughing is nice and I remember my dad’s contagious laugh. Grief, for me, is more like a spiral. The same emotions repeat as the spiral goes through different times, events, and memories. One minute I feel some momentary respite of acceptance, and the next I am dreaming of the toy in my grandfather’s house, a container of metal pieces that takes the shape of whatever you put behind it, that has my dad’s face and he is talking to us about how it is to see us from up there. Perhaps the hard part of this grief is the unpredicted nature of it. Sometimes the spiral takes me down, deep into my saddest thoughts and fears, and sometimes the spiral goes high up, into beautiful moments that lift me out of this sadness to an alert state of being and thankfulness and joy. My recent trips, with Daniela to South Africa, with Pierre and Daniela to Rwanda, and with our little family and grandmother Leslie to Western Uganda, had some wonderful moments. Driving towards Lake Kivu in Rwanda, on the way to Kibuye, with the lake adorned by the green hills, fields creating patterns on the horizon, and lush green everywhere, was one of those moments, when one cannot help but feel lucky. Rwanda’s was Daniela’s 6^th country. Pierre and I look through her passport and can’t help but giggle, and I know my dad would have found it tremendously hilarious and wonderful that she is so well traveled.  It is such a beautiful time, the way Daniela smiles at everything and everyone and looks around with curious eyes. The pure happiness and love that comes in her eyes for the simple things, a smile, a tickle, and tight hug, are moving reminders that we can learn the most from our children. In these moments, with Pierre, who is my rock, and my Daniela who is my light, in the beauty of this life we are lucky to have together, I think that certainly I have learned a lot from my dad, and perhaps he is also learning from me, and that he would not care about me adequately living in his memory, but about me living this imperfect life with happiness and love. 

   Daniela in Kampala, Uganda

Daniela and I at Cape Point, South Africa

Daniela and I by lake kivu in Rwanda

Daniela with her great grandmother, reminding us there is still joy during Guy's memorial