Around my Shabbes Table

It's mid April in Israel...But today it feels like mid December. The bitter cold, the thunder, lighting and pouring rain throughout the night. The howling winds into the early hours of the morning....I imagine the vicitms and they're crying, along with G-d...They'e crying bitter angry tears about the unspeakable and unfathomable loss that all of us have had to endure...Broken families, dead children, burning corpses, human ashes...

And later in the morning, the sun shows up, because that is who we are as a nation...After the darkness, the light always returns. But we can't see that beautiful light when we are blinded by darkness...So we seek the light, and then we find it.

I do my regular Thursday Shabbat shop before the 10 am siren, hoping to be outdoors when it sounds off. As I walk home with my shopping bags, I picture my 4 year old uncle and my grandparents in their early 40's. They too, were crying bitter tears last night in the middle of the night and earlier this morning. They were sobbing for their son and their brother(my father) and for their daughters and sisters (my aunts). They were sobbing for their nieces, nephews, grandchildren, great grandchildren and their great great grandchildren whom they never got to hug, kiss or caress.

They missed out on Britot, Bat Mitzvahs,  Bar Mitzvahs and weddings. Oh ,how I wish they could have been at my wedding and at the births of my children..I imagine what it would be like to sit around my Shabbes table with them singing beautiful Shabbes songs and harmonizing in perfect sync. I imagine baking challah with my beautiful grandmother and learning from her how to put the perfect touch to my cholent. I imagine my grandfather and my uncle taking my boys to shul and feeling so much pride as they watch them pray from the heart. I imagine listening to my grandparents share stories from their childhoods and I imagine myself soaking it all in, while thirsting for more...But these are just dreams that live deep within my imagination...

While standing still for the siren in the cold and windy morning, I feel their warm and loving embrace around me and I know they are with me. And I am with them. And that's how it will always be, for I carry their torch and that torch will continue to live within me, my children, their children and all generations to follow, Please G-d.


With Love,
Cigal