I return to Jerusalem with a stopover in Greece. As we fly over the Greek coastline, my imagination takes flight to the legend of Icarus, with his makeshift wings, reveling in the boundless happiness of freedom beneath the light and heat of the sun… And I picture him too, after he fell into that sea which is visible from my plane, adrift. How long can we survive like that, without anchors, before the inevitable questions arise: Why? For what purpose? Is there any meaning to it? …
Tel Aviv
Now as the plane was bound for Tel Aviv, while half asleep, I remembered a woman in the waiting area, who shared a confidence with me: “One day,” she said, “exhausted by the clamor of my little children—especially one who gave me no respite with his mischief—I went out into the street. In my agitation I kept repeating inwardly: I can’t take it anymore! He’s my son and I love him, but I can’t stand him! In that litany I confronted God: You don’t understand me! He’s my son and I love him, but I can’t stand him…! Suddenly,” she explained with great simplicity and an enormous smile, “a voice without words broke through inside me: Of course I understand you! How could I not understand you, who are my daughter? A great peace came over me: Daughter of God! I suddenly understood that love and suffering are compatible. And that you are not happier when you do not suffer and everything runs smoothly,” she concluded.
As my thoughts wander through these night hours, the plane lands in Tel Aviv. After getting through Customs, I will soon arrive home, finally! – my home, with its lights and shadows, its cracks and peeling paint—the scars that mark the passage of days and years—the place where they love me for who I am, not for what I have. And that is how I love them too. An affection forged from service, gratitude, and forgiveness; from conversations and silences, from joys and sorrows shared and endured.
The Nativity in Bethlehem
The family: the natural anchor that precedes us, and which, despite our limitations, we try to build every day. The family, the privileged place for learning to transcend our own limits; “to take small steps with meaning,” “to savor our experiences,” as A. Brooks, an expert in happiness, says
I think of my family and so many others here and everywhere that sustain the world like an invisible mesh—each one with its own personality, traditions and customs, its ways of understanding life and understanding itself. Natural families full of meaning, which, like the tree planted near streams of water, yield their fruit in due season and whose leaves do not wither (Psalm 1:3).
Dawn is breaking as, at last, I open the door of the house and am greeted by the aroma of steaming coffee—real coffee, freshly made, no substitutes! – and the warm embrace of the early risers.
By Carmen Rodríguez Éyre