Undercurrents

Enjoying life must be accentuated daily in the atmosphere of war and death. Simple things: sharing food with friends, swimming in the river in the summer, enjoying the soft grass your head rests on. To be able to see these blessings during our suffering means that we must first accept them, and to accept these things, we must first learn to enjoy them.

We decided to do this with our church this past week while planning when to do our baptisms - making a day out of visiting a local river and having some "shashlik" (fire-roasted meat and vegetables), all while celebrating the procession of faith and tradition. The soft breeze rustling in my hair and the scent of dirt and fire all invigorated me to think about how contradictory this was to what we knew to be our reality beyond the summer processions. While war raged on, we had set aside a special kind of life in its reality - and this life was the same thing we strived to protect so fervently.

The ability to be with our loved ones and not worry about having a missile fall on our heads, the feeling of satisfaction that comes with eating good food and not worrying about having to somehow feed your children while under occupation, not having to duck your head at any loud or shrieking sound - the chance to feel the soft breeze and cold water and to breathe the scent of warm dirt and not the stagnant air of the frontline tinged with the smell of blood.

The ability to simply feel. This was the life we were fighting for, the chance to breathe and be at peace.