The Meaning of Our Memorial Day for Me

Day 463 – I talked about the Memorial Day. I forgot to mention the siren that goes off when it starts. All over the country the sirens go off for a full minute and everyone stands in full attention to salute and honor the fallen soldiers; this is how the day started, yesterday, at 8pm. It’s chilling and it makes it so powerful. And in every city and village and kibbutz, every place where people live, there is a memorial ceremony. And then on the next day in the morning there are memorial services in all the military cemeteries in the country and ceremonies in every school and workplace and they all start at 11am with a siren that goes all over the country for two full minutes. It is my first Memorial Day here in 23 years, last year I was not here during that time, and I forgot how it feels. I forgot how powerful it is. Sadly, we live in a country that knew too many wars and terrorist attacks; and military service is mandatory here, so there is not a single person I believe that doesn’t know someone who died that way, someone we remember today. Even if our family was not hit directly, it is a friend from school, from work, from the army, the husband of, the son of, the daughter of… it is a very personal day for everyone. I was standing there during the ceremony and I remembered all my friends who died, and friends that got injured real bad and fight it every day and I thought about the horrific price we have to pay every day to live in this country. Years ago, when my son was born, I felt I cannot do that, I cannot raise a son just to send him at the age of 18 to the army and pray that it will not be him but someone else’s son, pray that this infamous knock on the door will never come. I just couldn’t do it. It took me years to understand that this is the only place in the world I can call home, that even if I don’t live here, everyone dear to me still does, and that you cannot escape faith. It took me so many years to understand that home is something you protect and not just run way from with the first sign of danger. That good or bad this is my country and I am proud to be part of it, that I hope another war will never come but if it will, I won’t run away, I’ll stay here and do whatever I can to help. To honor all the dead soldiers we remember today we have to live here and to live well, as a free nation, striving and ready to protect our right to live this way.

I am thankful to be here today, to feel all the way what it means to belong to this nation. I am thankful I made the decision to come back; it is my country, it ingrains in me, it’s who I am. I am thankful my youngest daughter is in the military now, I was thinking about her so much today; I am so proud of her and what she does, of her courageous decision to come back here and serve in the military, even though she was not born here, even though she had so many other options; she chose to belong and I admire her for that.