Declaring Independence

4th of July fireworks over the Mississippi River.

Exactly a year ago today, on July 4, 2017, I had a profound personal crisis.

Not many people know about this. At the time, I hid it completely from my family, and only spoke to a few friends who I knew would understand.

Last year on the 4th of July, I was in Ocean City, New Jersey with my parents and sister. It’s our favorite family vacation spot; we’ve been going there almost every year since we were young kids. We always stay in the same hotel on the boardwalk, and hit the same restaurants and shops and mini-golf courses each time. It holds a lot of memories and sentimental significance for all of us.

Last year, we watched fireworks explode over the beach from the boardwalk, surrounded by thousands of other families and tourists. It was a uniquely American experience, and it struck me with particular significance to be celebrating the land of my birth with my family for the first time since I’d left it, and them, to move across the world six years earlier.

I remember thinking, as I watched the fireworks go off in concert with the usual deeply patriotic songs we all know, that American independence meant so little to me in comparison with Israeli independence, that as a Jew, the fact that a Jewish state had struggled and succeeded as a living, modern nation meant so much more than the fact that a few hundred years ago, some Englishmen had seceded from some other Englishmen.

And yet, at the same time, I loved this - loved the pomp of it, the pure, simple patriotism, the red, white and blue of it. I envied the Americans who felt the way about the US that I did about Israel - that it represented them, their values, their roots. That it meant more to them than any other country. They didn’t have divided allegiance; they pledged allegiance to one flag. They didn’t wrestle with loving America, big, beautiful, easy, bountiful America, while also feeling loyalty to a country like Israel, small, scrabbly, difficult, complex, meaningful. They didn’t have to choose. They never had to make a choice between basic things they loved. Like I did.

I made that choice every time I got back on the plane. I chose Israel, little, fierce, challenging, dusty, hardy Israel, the home of my people, the background of our history, God’s chosen land. The country I had made my own home, where I’d found friends and community, where I’d discovered and established my own place within Judaism, where I had meaningful work, where I felt I belonged.

And where I was utterly, completely unhappy.

I wrote when I began this blog that I wasn’t ready to talk about Israel, about leaving, about all of the crap surrounding that moment in my life. I don’t know that I’m ready now to go into what led to that decision, but I’m ready to share with you the moment it began, the moment the barriers between the life I had chosen and my idea of the future came down. This was the moment when the paradigm shifted, when my mindset opened and molded itself to new ideas, when suddenly things became possible.

Until then, I had suffered from that constant division in loyalties. It was incredibly painful every time I had to leave my family and my home to go back to Israel. Every time, I questioned my choice, but I never came to a new conclusion. Every time, I was wracked with guilt. Every time, I cried. Every time, I got on the plane.

And it sounds simple. It’s not like anything or anyone was keeping me in Israel by force. I could have left any time I wanted. I had some obligations, but none that couldn’t be resolved in good will. I was free to go.

But I didn’t, because I didn’t really want to. Because in my heart and soul, I still felt connected to Israel, I still felt it was the right place for me, I still wanted to live there, to be Israeli, to walk the Zionism walk. I didn’t want to theoretically support Israel, I wanted to live out my ideals.

I’ve spoken a bit here about my black and white outlook, about a personal philosophy that doesn’t accept compromises. Once I had committed to Israel, to the Zionist project, once I had taken upon my soul the assumptions and promises of making aliyah, of living in Israel, it was impossible for me to just switch. I couldn’t justify it within myself. I couldn’t be weak, I couldn’t just give up, I couldn’t just change my mind.

And in the early years I really felt all the love and idealism that goes along with aliyah. I made a lot of really awesome friends. I felt connected to God, to the land of Israel, to Judaism. It’s only been the last two or three years that things started changing. And at that point I did feel that I was becoming more open to the idea of returning to America, but in realistic terms that didn’t mean anything. I never thought about it in a concrete way, I never made plans, never even thought about what it would look like. I just knew that there was a possibility it could happen someday. If and when the time came, I reasoned, I would know.

Fast forward to July 4, 2017.

As we watched the fireworks together, my sister became emotional. She said she was so happy we were all there together. And I knew exactly what she meant, and my heart was so conflicted, because I loved that we were all there together, and at the same time I knew that my life choices meant these moments would always be rare and bittersweet. Always within the happiness of togetherness lay the reality of separation.

The Formans celebrate July 4 at the Jersey Shore, 2017

That night, in the hotel room, I couldn’t sleep. I lay in bed suffocated by anxiety and doubt, confusion, fear, crazy thoughts, questions, panic. Eventually I got up and took my journal to the bathroom, where I knelt on the floor and poured out the anguish in my soul. I don’t have that journal here, so I can’t tell you exactly what I wrote, though I wish I could. I know I was conscious of the crisis as I was having it. I was excruciatingly inside that moment of turmoil, I could feel myself being physically crushed by its weight. Because finally, the moment had come, the moment when everything I had accepted as true suddenly came unmoored and a different possibility flooded in: the possibility of staying. Of returning.

For whatever reason, I had hit the threshold. I had been building up to it for a long time, I knew that. I had been very, very unhappy. And somewhere inside I’d been preparing myself for this moment, though not consciously. There’s a difference between complaining about Israel and yearning for the comforts of America, and actually thinking about the realities of selling all your furniture and leaving the country. And suddenly I found myself crossing that line. I found myself thinking about quitting my job, about subletting my apartment, about buying a one-way ticket home.

And those thoughts thrilled me. Yes, they were scary, terrifying, really. It was a lot to suddenly face. Tying up all those loose ends, dealing with all of the shit required to actually take this step, thinking about that was overwhelming. But thinking about coming home, being back in America, being with my family, it felt so good. It felt right.

The actual decision-making that followed this crisis moment took months. Between July 4 and December 18, when I actually got on a plane back to New York, there were many, many, many more moments of thinking/agonizing/list-making/inner dialogue/discussion with friends, family and therapists. It wasn’t an easy choice. But it was the right one.

Now, exactly a year after that crisis, I’m in another hotel room, this one in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, a stop on my 7-week cross-country solo road trip adventure of a lifetime. I’ve been back in the US for six months. I’ve just come from visiting my boyfriend in Nashville. A year ago, I could never, ever, ever have known where I would be today.

I watched the fireworks show over the Mississippi River this year, rather than the Atlantic Ocean. I was surrounded by lots of local families and joyous kids, but I was alone. I took in the holiday along the route of my continuing quest.

Life is untwisting itself, unfolding into a path ahead of me. I don’t know where I’ll be next July 4th, but I know that I’m finally on the right road.

Happy Independence Day, everyone.