Car Update, Aliyah Love

First, the car.  The insurance company finally deposited the money into our bank account!  Today we go to the bank to transfer the money (bye bye lotsa shekel, it was nice seeing you for your brief visit, please come again) to the car dealer, finalize the car insurance, and.....maybe even get our car.

I say "maybe even" because I have learned never to expect anything to work well.  I'm pretty sure we'll be driving away from the lot and the salesman will be running after us with three Mossad agents firing Uzis, screaming, "You forgot to sign the form!" and waving some random government document in the air.  I have very low expectations these days.

In other news, we met with friends who came to Israel for a visit.  I don't know if they will ever make aliyah, but they sure want to.  Now, most of the time when we meet with friends who have not made aliyah we follow our hard and fast rule, learned the hard way - don't talk about the wonders of living in Israel.  Why? Because lovely as our friends and family are, and caring as they are, those of us who have made aliyah know one thing - you only "get" aliyah once you do it.  Trying to explain it is frustrating for both us and them.

You just can't imagine it beforehand, although we wish we could explain it to them.  I know this sounds like what some out there call aliyah snobbery - I prefer to think of it as "aliyah love."

I don't like the phrase "aliyah snobbery" which I hear people use, because it implies that I think I'm better than someone else.  I certainly don't, God forbid.  I just have this very deep, powerful desire for my fellow Jews out there to come here and feel this utter joy - is that snobbery or love?   I know that people don't like hearing that life could be better somewhere else - but when it comes to making aliyah I'm willing to make that statement.These friends get that and were happy to listen to us go on and on about what becoming an Israeli does to you.

Here's the thing about aliyah love. I kind of want people to understand that no matter what they imagine it will be like - it will be ten million times better.  It will be better in ways they cannot possibly imagine.  They will feel at home for the first time in their lives, they will realize what it means to be part of something so miraculous that hits you in the gut every single day. They will feel "authentic" because this is the land God gave us to live in and we are living in it, as He told us to do.  They will see their children/grandchildren growing up as part of our homeland, contributing to it every single day.

They will know what it means to know they are part of the future of the Jewish people in the most important way possible.  Because, in the end, we can only really be ourselves in our own home. They will live in a culture where non-religious people quote the Chumash and don't even quite get the fact that, as irreligious as they are, they are thousands of times more spiritual and grounded in Judaism than their cohorts outside of Israel.

I am re-reading this and it isn't even doing my feelings justice.

Sitting with our friends and knowing that they felt our joy was very rewarding and made us realize even more deeply how right our lives feel right now.  Knowing they were leaving back to the States and we could stay - I felt badly for them, and they felt badly too.  Leaving Israel is physically painful for many of us.

So I'm here to share the aliyah love, baby.