The past twelve or so hours of travel from Berlin to Tel Aviv have been a crazy mix of emotion. It was so wonderful to see bro and Keki and traveling around was a perfect traipse down memory lane. However, I couldn't help but get excited as the days and then hours counted down to my arrival back in Israel. This crazy mixed up world. I didn't leave feeling particularly attached to Israel and two weeks later I realize how much I liked the oven hot, dry heat or the farms springing out of nowhere. I even miss people yelling at me in Hebrew and laughing at my horrible attempts to read signs.
I began to think of how wonderful it was that I had the freedom to sell all of my things, travel halfway around the world, and develop a new home and a new attachment in whatever place on the map I chose. I began to marvel at my own resilience in the most narcissistic of ways. I began to think that it was going to be easy to pick up and move here. Pride comes before the fall?
Immediately this changed when I walked out of the gates and even at one in the morning the place was filled to the brim with welcoming families. People ignored the security guards to run and embrace much missed family members. People wept and a guy with a dog jumped from behind a pillar asking me something excitedly in Hebrew and brandishing a homemade sign that read "Dominique??".
Even though I might live here, I don't know if I'll ever have that. That kind of welcome. That knowledge that there are at least 3 people in my immediate vicinity that have wanted nothing in the world more than seeing me step into that arrivals area. There's a damn good chance that that place of exuberant welcome is never Israel for me.
But I know some places and some people always will be waiting at that airport arrivals gate. I know that I'll always have a home in Sacramento, San Fransisco, L.A. (though chances are I won't be visiting during the NBA season... let's be real), Raleigh, Atlanta, New York, maybe Japan, and wherever the heck else my talented family and friends decide to settle. So maybe Israel will just be a stop over and maybe it won't exactly be home for very long... but I don't think I've ever been more proud of anything so much as the homes I have or have created around the world.
All my love from Ben Gurion Airport after a safe flight.... home?
ALWAYS a big welcome in Atlanta/Raleigh/wherever I am. And for the record, I am thoroughly amazed at your resilience and passion for life. Miss you, miss you, and miss you a thousand times over.
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