The central bus station was a zoo. Sarah rarely traveled outside the city, and when she did, she usually caught a ride with friends to make Shabbat at some mutual destination. There were near fist-fights in the crowded line through the security check. Once at the actual check point, everyone stood back to let the single individual go through the metal detector, and then rushed afterward to place their bag on the conveyor belt through the x-ray machine.
Inside the station wasn't that much better. Soldiers were everywhere. Their huge knapsacks, probably bulging with weeks of laundry, nestled high on their backs, automatic rifles slung on straps over their shoulders. There was every shape, size and color of people busily rushing to and fro. What caught Sarah's eye in particular were the black Ethiopian Jewess. Many had very refined features, almost European in look, contrasted with the black skin that made they seem so exotic. No, Sarah decided after a moment it was their eyes. The brightness of their eyes caught one's attention. All the rest was external.
A group of young Scandinavian women also carrying their 'home' on their back walked past her. An elderly Shepardic couple stopped to ask her where the elevator could be found. Uncertain of how to pronounce that word correctly, despite the fact that this very second she had heard the old woman ask her, she simply pointed with a smile and muttered 'sham' (There!) to emphasize her point. Both the woman and the man thanked her, more a blessing than a courtesy before they laboriously continued on their way.
Getting on the bus was another test of her humanity. The best way to survive was to pretend that she was gate crashing at a Boston Bears football game, only without the use of elbows.
[Name of Boston football team]
The ride to Shevut Ami was exhausting. Being the polite American girl she was, Sarah ended up standing the entire trip, letting some poor girl six months pregnant sit. She hadn't realized how many communities there were in Gush Etzion until the bus seemed to enter every single one making a big circle inside each one to permit the various passengers with all their Friday shopping and weekend luggage unpack the cargo bay underneath the bus. The entire trip she barely got to see anything through the heavily scratched windows. The windows were triple paned glass, the double inner panes thick bullet proof glass. The outer was apparently some kind of plastic that weathered badly and had turned a kind of opaque fog, without the moisture. She could see buildings and major land features, but it was difficult to enjoy the view.
When the bus started down the steep incline toward Shevut Ami, there was only three people left on what had been a standing-room only packed bus when they had left Jerusalem. She couldn't wait to get off and sit down on some non-moving stone or bench and breath fresh and not recycled air. To her surprise, Shifra was waiting for her at the bus stop at the entrance to Shevut Ami.
The older woman took the bags from Sarah's hands as Sarah pulled her own knapsack out from the cargo bay.
"It's so good to see you." The two 'air-kissed' in that quasi-affectionate style most Israeli women seemed to expect. Somehow Shifra's tone of voice and warmth seemed more real than the stylized kiss.
"I'm glad to get off that bus! My head is spinning!"
"Do you want to sit down for a minute. I often do when I return from Jerusalem. The endless turns and dips are almost as bad as a roller coaster."
"I'm fine!" Sarah lied, not wanting to hold her hostess up unnecessarily.
"Here lets walk through the plots rather than down the road." Said Shifra as she led the way down a path between the various houses.
"How are things going at the dig?"
"We're just about finished. This coming week we'll have extracted the last of the debris and only the large stones will remain. I understand they are bringing some sort of Army tractor with a crane to lift them out. Depending upon what they find underneath them, if anything, we'll be finished either the same day or at most another week."
"It must be exciting to be involved in discovering objects that have remained hidden for such a long time."
Sarah was surprised to see they were already arriving at the Ben Ari's home, but from the other side. The side away from the road.
"Yes, but truthfully, it was the discovery of that man wrapped in his prayer shawl and wearing these ancient tefillin that doesn't leave me. We're not supposed to tell anyone but I guess I can trust you of all people."
The two women looked at each other and both broke out in a stifled giggle.
"I should hope so!" teased Shifra.
"Well they are pretty certain that the man they found scratched a message in the plaster of the wall before he died."
"That should be something. Do they think they'll be able to decipher it?" Shifra asked as she opened the side door and ushered Sarah into the house.
"How's Yigal?" Shifra asked as she walked away from Sarah into the kitchen. Sarah looked up to see her back. She sensed that perhaps Shifra didn't want to look at her when she asked or when Sarah answered.
"He certainly puts in a lot of hours. Most of the time I catch a ride down to the site with him in the morning. I sleep the entire trip. Later during the day I catch an hour after lunch, a little siesta. Not your son. He is so busy keeping everybody else occupied and making certain everything is done 'by-the-book' as he calls it. Its not a surprise that he literally sleeps the Shabbat from end-to-end." Sensing that maybe she said too much and perhaps said something that would cause Shifra to be disappointed in her son she added," well at least I don't hear him, but maybe he does sneak out from time to time. I'm pretty beat myself." Shifra had put an electric kettle on and was preparing a couple of cups for a hot drink when Sarah plopped down on one of the kitchen chairs as if to emphasize her exhaustion.
"Are you finished cooking already?" She asked, looking around and seeing a clean organized kitchen, the only hint of cooking and baking were the delicious aromas hanging in the air.
"Its not hard when you start Wednesday night!" Shifra laughed. "Tea? Coffee?"
"I think I'd better take the coffee, maybe it will help me from falling asleep."
"You've enough time to take a two hour nap if you go up and shower now. I can't promise you'll have hot water if you try showering after your nap?
Sarah excused herself and carried her bags up to the second floor. She knew which room to go to. Yigal's room, with all his books piled in disarray on the shelves against one wall. Above his headroom the entire wall was covered with photographs of Yigal and friends or Yigal and family hiking, swimming, climbing in short, exploring every facet of the Land of Israel. It was with these thoughts she laid down after a quick shower. Yigal and the Land of Israel.
A short polite knock woke her up for candle lighting. The men had already gone to the synagogue for evening prayers. Just like last time, Shifra sat out on her patio, the one sheltered by the leafy branches of two palm tress on either side of the paved floor. The view out over the village toward the setting sun was breath taking.
"Its magnificent!" Sarah said as she said quietly beside Shifra.
"Shifra didn't answer immediately as she was looking into a sidur (prayer book)."
"Oh, sorry, I didn't see."
After a minute Shifra raised her head.
"No harm done. The sunset is particularly moving. It is a time of winding down. I often think, as foolish as it sounds, it is as if the sun is retiring just as we do at the end of a long day. The birds chirp incessantly twice a day. In the first hour of light and in the last hour before the light of day disappears. Then quiet and peace cover the land."
Sarah didn't say anything. She was thinking, 'If only!' She had never been around weapons before. Nobody she knew even hunted, although it is quiet possible some of her friends parents owned hand guns for personal protection. Now she worked day-in day-out in the middle of a battle ground. The army had placed concrete barriers to protect the dig and the trailers they were using as work areas and offices, but astonishingly, they did not go out and stop the Arabs who spent the better part of each day trying to kill them. It was totally absurd. Something directly out of Kafka.
"A candy for your thoughts?" Shifra jokingly offered her.
"You looked so serious and pensive. It didn't look as if you were thinking about the sun's disappearance?"
"I guess I'm a little naive about things, I mean the Arabs shooting at us all day long and all the army does is put up concrete barriers. I mean one crazy guy took pot shots at commuters and half the police in the United States left no rock unturned until they found and arrested him."
"Its difficult. There isn't much I can say to help you make sense of it. The best way to understand it is to realize it is the opposite of common sense. It is a small group of idealists cut off from the reality of day-to-day life that think if they will something, it will happen. It doesn't work that way, but as long as they don't have to face the reality, they keep on making the same ill fated mistake."
Her words were cut off as David and a young man Sarah had never met face-to-face entered the patio from the dining room.
"Shabbat Shalom!"
"Wow!" was all the young man said as he looked directly at Sarah with not a little bit of admiration on his face. Sarah had to look away from embarrassment.
"Chagai. Is that a way to welcome our guest?" Shifra asked, part in all seriousness and partly in motherly amazement at the behaviour of her younger son.
"I'm sorry. It's just ..."
"Its just what? Chagai?" Shifra would give him no avenue of retreat.
"Well I heard that Sarah was beautiful but I had no idea how beautiful!"
At that even Shifra had to chuckle.
"Good save son! Now lets go back to the kitchen before you put your foot in your mouth again, and this time you might not be able to get it out!" David laughingly dragged Chagai by the arm back into the house.
"He's in the armoured corp isn't he?"
"Yes. I apologize if he embarrassed you. I'm astounded he was so ..."
"So forward?"
"Well, yes. It isn't like him."
"It sounds like someone filled his head with nonsense and he bought into it."
"What, that you are a very remarkable, intelligent and attractive young woman?"
Sarah's eyes open wide at hearing such a strong compliment spoken so openly and directly.
"I'm not used to hearing such things said about me." she said in a quiet voice, as if lowering the volume of the conversation might be more modest and appropriate than brazen boastfulness.
"Just because you are too modest to hear such things, doesn't mean they aren't true." With that Shifra offered her hand and and-in-hand the two women walked back into the house.
Later as she laid in bed waiting for sleep she thought of how it seemed so natural to show affection, to hold Shifra's hand or have her shoulders massaged as Shifra walked by. Her mother never touched her. As she thought about it, at her graduation her mother didn't even hug or kiss her. Instead she shook her hand. Shook her hand as if she was so sort of stranger or something.
Her poor mother, was the last thing she consciously thought about. A poor woman who wasn't even capable of expressing affection to her own daughter. Sarah felt sorry for her. Sarh felt so lucky to have met a mother like Shifra who could demonstrate to her that there was another way. A human, warm way to express how you felt about someone you liked. She liked Shifra she thought, and with that she fell asleep.
The next day was a long quiet lazy day. Yigal's brother was a funny young guy. Sarah started to think he was actually hitting up on her, but as the day drew on she realized that was just his way. It made her wonder what Yigal was like before ... before he forgot how to be carefree. That was a thought. She wondered if Yigal had once known how to express his feelings for others in the same natural open way his mother did. That definitely was something to think about.
"Why?" Dummy. What are you thinking of? Yigal is off on a direction different from hers. He was all wrapped up in his anguish and self imposed pain. What did she want to get serious about such a problematical person for? Another source of a smile. It's a shame Chagai is only twenty two. She could really go for a couple like Shifra and David as in-laws.
That night after Shabbat on the bus back to Jerusalem she succeeded in getting a seat right in front near the driver. One of the perks of getting on at the first stop. This time, although it was night, she marveled at the different communities. Each with its different 'flavour'. Some more ostentatious, others simpler and XXXX. What they all seemed to have in common was their family orientation. Homes with yards. Every little neighbourhood seemed to have a pocket park with swings and slides. It seemed that every community had endless speed bumps to keep the traffic at a safe speed for the children and mothers who must use these streets during daylight hours.
The other thing that amazed her were the 'trampistim'. She knew young people travelled every where by hitch hiking, but to see dozens of youngsters who all seemed like they were in junior high standing on the side of the road in the dark of night was something else. That would have been amazing anywhere, but this was the so-called "territories" - Indian Country where if you asked anyone in the communities on the coastal plain, here was "dangerous". That the vast majority of Israeli victims of terror died of terror attacks on buses in the major cities or in restaurants or hotels was another thing entirely. Don't confuse people's irrational fears with the facts. None-the-less it was a sight she wouldn't soon forget.
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