Our First Day

Tonight was the official start of our family trip. While some families came early, by dinner, all of us (almost 70 total) were together to start this amazing journey. Truly, this is more than a vacation, it is a spiritual pilgrimage. You can feel the anticipation--the grandmother who "can't wait to see Israel through my grandchildrens' faces," the mother who "knows my kids will remember this forever," the father who "can't believe my son and I are finally here," and the kids who are asking, "what's in this salad?" and "when are we shopping?" For each generation on this trip, there are hopes, dreams, anxieties, confusion, and above all, a sense that this is the trip of a lifetime. While we hope that everyone will visit Israel again soon, there will never be another first trip, another trip with everyone just this age and just like this.

As I look out from our hotel, I am personally struck by how Israel is kind of like the Jewish holidays--every time, it is different because I am different. Outside my window is the apartment where my now-husband lived during our first year in Israel, when we met. Ten years ago, we could not have even imagined what our lives would be like. And now, I walk these streets as a rabbi, a wife, a mother...a different person in many ways than I was my first time here. 

And while Jerusalem has changed in some ways, it is fundamentally an eternal place. It is a mirror, a place for us to come and reflect, to think back on our first time seeing these stones (for some of our parents, that was when they were teens!) and to realize how we have grown. For those who are here for the first time, there is a sense that they are making history--for themselves and their families. One of our kids commented about the sidewalks, "you can almost skate it's so smooth!" I told her that is because wherever we walk, generations have been there before. On so many levels, that is true. Tomorrow we will be in the City of David, the Kotel, the Jewish Quarter--we will walk our people's history, and in so doing, we will create our own chapter. 

Rabbi Lapidus