Echoes of gunfire, past and present

This past Wednesday evening my parents took us out for dinner at one of our favorite restaurants; Beit Ticho (Ticho House) on HaRav Kook Street.  It was a celebratory dinner in honor of Ariella having been accepted to the prestigious Pelech High School in Jerusalem. 

After finishing the delicious meal we were getting into the car and I paused to point out a stone wall near the spot where we were parked.  The wall was pocked with dozens of bullet holes.  I'm sure a Jerusalem historian could probably say what battle was fought there... but I simply voiced my guess that it was probably from the Six Day War since the line dividing the Israeli and Jordanian forces was only a few blocks from the spot.  But in truth the bullet holes could just as easily have been from the War of Independence.  After all, Jerusalem is no stranger to the sound of gunfire.

As we pulled away from the restaurant I through for a moment about telling my parents about Rav Kook, the great man for whom the street was named.  They enjoy hearing such historical tidbits during our Jerusalem wandering, but in the end I got sidetracked by a more mundane discussion of which route would be best to take back to their apartment in the German Colony. 

By the time I heard the news last night of the terror attack on the the School that Rav Kook had founded and nurtured, I was too stuck in the present to think much about connections to the past.

During the night I woke up a few times and checked the news for updated details of the attack, and upon checking my email I found the terrible news that one of the victims of the shooting had been the 16 year old son of some friends of ours.  That by itself would have been devastating enough, but this tragedy was unimaginable. 

I have known the boy's step mother since we were both single, and we have many mutual friends.  I remember trying to comfort her in a Brooklyn hospital room many years ago as her young husband was slipping away due to medical complications in the aftermath of a traffic accident.  When he died, I couldn't imagine how this young woman would ever be able to put her life back together again. 

But somehow she did. 

When we moved to Israel, Zahava and I were delighted to find that this woman had made aliyah and was living in our community.   We frequently bumped into her on the street and often sat and 'shmoozed' with her at the local park on shabbat.  She'd married a wonderful man - a second marriage for both of them - and the family they had made for themselves was a seamless collection... some his... but all truly theirs.

The news that tragedy had visited this woman again was almost too much to imagine.  I wanted to wake Zahava to tell her, not because it couldn't wait 'til morning (bad news can always wait!), but because I didn't think I could bear the news alone.  But in the end I let her sleep.

As if sensing my lonely despair, Yonah soon padding down the stairs and joined me in my bed.  His nocturnal visits are not that unusual but in a change of roles, this time he would be comforting me. 

I lay awake for hours with Yonah sleeping next to me.  I tried to find sleep myself, but for the most part I alternated between checking the news on my laptop and covering Yonah's face with enough kisses that I would never be able to look back and regret having missed even one.  But even my small attentions to my sleeping son were bitter sweet because of the knowledge that just a few hundred yards away there was a family whose young son would never again awake.

As the time for Yonah's school bus came and went (and emails arrived with funeral details), I continued to hold his sleeping form next to me.  There will (G-d willing) always be time enough for school and play and army service and life.   But with the echoes of gunfire, past and present, ringing in our ears this morning, I'm sure many Israeli parents had trouble letting their children go.

    המקום ינחם אותך בתוך שאר אבלי ציון וירושלים