Finding a Foothold

My Foundations

I have always been a very observant person, I have always enjoyed the exquisite details present in nature. I have always found comfort in just being in and around the wonders of the natural world. As a child my escape from the world was taking long walks in the local countryside and listening to the music of nature.

My love of nature drew me to question my place within this world and my place in the grand scheme of things. My catholic upbringing dropped by the wayside as I searched for meaning in my existence. I have, ever since then, been a very spiritual individual.

After the events of October 7th 2023 my whole being was thrown into an existential crisis. I had lost my foothold and I felt like I was in free-fall. It took over a month to recover from the initial shock before I could even think about the direction in which my life would take. I also knew that as a father and husband, my priorities were to the well-being of my family.

The immediate Aftermath

Our life changed overnight. From planning a festive weekend to surviving the wrath of hell is not something any human being should ever have to experience, but this is the situation that I was in and it was my duty to try an get though this as best I could.

I would gather my family together each evening in hotel we were evacuated to and hold a family meeting. This meeting was to strengthen our bond and share our feeling with each other. We were all broken from our experience but we were stronger together. Stronger Together became our family slogan. We even thought about getting a tattoo.

We are all dealing with life as best we can with the help of various therapies that are appropriate and beneficial. I have always best healed without therapy but under the circumstances even I undertook a few therapy sessions. 

Therapy for me gave me a direction for pursuing my own self-healing. I also learned that the specific traumas we were subject to, are not your even day types of trauma. For me, healing from within was my therapy, because at the end of the day it is me who has to do the deep-healing work.

Revisiting “Home”

I have revisited the remains of our home a handful times over the last eight months. Each visit fraught with emotions and anxiety. I pause to take a few breaths while I write this. 

The home we had created was the culmination of our lives together in Kibbutz Beeri. We had earned the right to a new house, build to the specifications we had chosen within the options that we had. Everything was our choice, our style and our design. From furniture to fridge, from tiles to toilet, everything had our attention bestowed upon it. We poured so much love into this home of ours.

We lived in our home for 5 years in a quiet neighborhood which was simply perfect for us. We had a beautiful garden with roses, herbs and an ocean of sweet-peas in the springtime. We had a mango tree that bore the sweetest fruit you ever tasted as well as citrus and almond trees. The almond blossom was always such a sight to behold. This was my first real garden and tending it brought me great joy and a deep sense of peace.

The most spectacular wisteria grew up on our front balcony. This flowered the most beautiful purple flowers and gave the sunbirds a perfect location to build their nests. I was never much of a gardener, but this humble garden was ours and it brought nature closer to me.

Our herb garden flourished and still does, albeit overgrown. We regularly picked herbs for tea and for cooking. The rosemary, sage and zuta were picked most often. The jasmine gave a beautiful fragrance when in bloom.

I learned to tend my garden, I maintained the house when required, I had all the tools like every man should. I enjoyed the life we had created and I felt settled and at one with myself and with the world. Life was peaceful. Life was good.

Returning to witness the complete and utter devastation was a whole new trauma within itself. Shock was the overarching feeling on the first visit back. A shock so deep that my emotions couldn’t be expressed. Everywhere my eyes settled I would barely recognize what I was seeing. Nothing resembled how it used to be. How could a fire so intense, a hatred so intense have done this to our home. I remember recording everything on video. I was in a state of utter disbelief. Glass, melted and deformed sat welded to my coffee machine in a pile of rubble that was our kitchen. The roof had caved in and only we know how unrecognizable everything was. Our home had been erased.

As we wandered from room to room it became painfully obvious the reality of the situation. Not only had we lost our home, we had lost so very much more.