Forty Days

Forty days left.

People have been asking me lately how I feel about "going back home." When someone phrased it that way yesterday, I just laughed. "I don't have a home," I replied. And I don't. We sold our townhouse to come here, and we're not returning to the same suburb of DC. The area we'd lived in for the 7 years before this move is not where I'd grown up and not where I had roots of any kind. I long ago realized that "home" was wherever I was at the moment. This is often the reality for a TCK (third culture kid). 

But back to the original question -- how do I feel about returning Stateside?

The truth is, I'm quite conflicted. There have been some REALLY difficult things about my time at Tantur. I have the feeling that my overarching memory of this specific place will be one of loneliness and disappointment. There are also, of course, difficult things about living in Jerusalem, especially as close as we are to Bethlehem and the checkpoint into the West Bank. My answer to the question, "Have you liked it here?" is "Yes -- and no." It's complicated. 

And family life this year has been more challenging than in many previous years. The combination of a two-year-old and a newborn and multiple tweens/teens has just about done me in. Even on the days when I feel like I'm maybe "getting it right" with one or more of them, someone is bound to throw me for a loop. We've had hours of tears, countless raised voices, and a growing sense that our family is coming apart at the seams. Marriage has been interesting and I've struggled with months of depression. 

Despite all the heartache and frustrations, I'm also deeply sad about returning to the US. Ever since I was little, I was friends with people different from me, whether by color of skin or nationality. I lived in University of California family student housing for the majority of my childhood, where there were students from around the world, and then at age 14 moved to Nigeria. As an adult, I've lived in a few other countries, as well as suburbs with international populations. I love the beauty of diversity, I love learning about other people and cultures, I love 
hearing their music and eating their food. So every time I have to return to the US after some time abroad, a large part of me is quite melancholy.

Besides my broader appreciation for the world, I also have grown to love this place. As mixed up as it is, as much pain and suffering as there are here, Palestine/Israel has been a special place to live for 9 months. I've gotten to see buildings and/or ruins from all kinds of eras and I've gained understanding about distances between places mentioned in the Bible and what those places looked like. I've greatly enjoyed the diversity of the land's topography and botany, as well as the beauty of different people groups who live here. I love hearing Arabic and Hebrew, Muslim calls to prayer and Jewish songs that begin Shabbat. I love experiencing the sights and smells within Greek Orthodox and Catholic churches, and hearing Jesus' name praised in traditions and languages not my own.

Most of all, by living so close to Bethlehem, I've seen the Separation Wall with my own eyes, experienced the checkpoint dozens of times, and heard firsthand accounts from many Palestinians about how the conflict affects them. What used to be just "head knowledge" now feels more real. Of course it is still just knowledge for me, as I don't personally suffer the violence and fear and discrimination that my neighbors do. But at least I have faces and names in my mind's eye. And I have my handful of representative experiences, like soldiers boarding my bus to check IDs, and delays at the checkpoint, and Palestinians being forced off the bus at the border while the non-Palestinians remain on. Why is this what I appreciate most of all? Because it is real. It is now. I would rather know what people are facing here, than think that everything's great or just another news story of terrorists and bombings. 

Forty days left. Not long at all. May I make the most of it...