Yesterday was one year in Israel. Not one year ever. One year since I made Aliyah, and came to live and serve in this country as a soldier of the IDF. I know everyone (my Mom particularly) will be shocked that I have actually posted a blog, but I figured an anniversary is quite a milestone and a perfect opportunity to look back and see where I started this year and where I find myself now.
Lets start with the location: Israel, Beit Haemek. Now lets get to what I have accomplished since then. ONE: I am in the army. (I started October 10, 2010), TWO. I am in the IAF’s Elite Unit 669, THREE. I have short hair(okay that one was just for kicks).
In the past 365 years of my life, I have learned what it is to be a soldier in this country. A country of war and (as my commander puts it) preparation for war. I have suffered unimaginably, been to unbelievable downs, that in my prior life I thought not possible. I have been at the point in which I thought all was lost; That I had reached my point of quitting, and wanted to give up more than anything in the world. But I didn’t, not because I didn’t want to, because I couldn’t. I still haven’t been able to place what it is exactly that keeps me from giving up, but I have something in me that no matter the suffering I seem to find myself at the end of the road.
I learned to be a Field and In-Flight Combat Medic, How to fight with a team of 4,6, and 12 people and take over mountains in the field. I learned what it means to sprint with a stretcher on your shoulder and what it is to carry someone on your back for a full kilometer in the middle of the night after the hardest week your body has ever suffered through. I learned to cable wounded soldiers/people up and down hovering helicopters and soon I will be learning how to scuba dive to further expertise my abilities to rescue people in the ocean.
One year ago I was civilian just like everyone else fresh out of my first year of college and already planning to intern in Manhattan over the summer. Now I find myself doing 18 hour days…everyday, exercising 4+ hours a day and spending the rest of the day learning how to be an elite soldier in one of the world most expert evacuation and rescue units. I used to talk about calculus and which party I was going to after Hillel on Friday nights and now I talk about how to cable rescue pilots behind enemy lines after a crash. How much has my life changed? Drastically. How much have I changed? I don’t know. I still feel like me, but I think I stand taller. Not out of arrogance, but out of pride for myself and my teammates. I think I have matured and become a bit tougher, for better or for worse.
I have an unbelievable amount of satisfaction at the end of most of my weeks, something that I never before experienced in my life apart from days I spent climbing the mountains and cliffs of the Sierra Nevada’s. (There is no better satisfaction than that, but this is getting pretty close.)
The past year has flown by, which I am sure everyone’s has but I think for me it is a little different because since the first day in the army my team mates and I have been looking forward to “sof maslool” (being done with training, ergo: to be operational), to being a Lochem(warrior) and being able to be on call for active operations. I’m not saying I’m anywhere near that, but it feels so much closer than it did in December and just by the training we are doing I can tell in my mind that I have come a long way. I still remember my first visit to an army base that lasted about 3 hours. I sat in an unbearably hot auditorium still in use from the British control of the Mandate ,almost assuredly, and read brochures about the army’s elite units, of course day dreaming about being in 669, day dreaming about doing the things that I am now training to do. Because of the nature of the unit I cant talk too much about what were doing especially the details of it, but its safe to say that its not walking in two straight lines to the lunch room anymore.
I think that I cannot fully understand where I am and what I am doing because I am in it. I live it and breathe it 24 hours a day and there is not ever time to really zoom back and see my life from above and over time, like one would have to understand who I am, where I came from and where I am now. It was always my dream to save people out of the ocean and the thought that I am getting somewhat close to that(closer than 99.99 percent of the people in the world) I am on the whole very satisfied with where I am. However that is not to say that I cruise at all or that it is easy at all for me, I struggle most days with one thing or another but I believe that this is how we got stronger, if your not struggling your not getting stronger. So I guess, just so everyone is clear I am having a very difficult time, but in a good way I think. I feel that I am stressing things that could use some stretching and learning things that can only help me to learn and become a more enriched and enlightened individual, two things that interest me greatly.
One of my greatest friends left me a voicemail yesterday that motivated me at the deepest and greatest level to pick myself off the ground and propel myself to the end of this thing. She told me not forget that even if I am not proud of myself, that she is and there are so many people that are, and are praying for me everyday and only wishing for my success. I think one thing that HAS happened in the last 12 months is that I have lost touch with where I came from and why exactly I came here in the first place and why I find myself in the unit that I am in. I believe it has to do with idealism but I think it also has to do with humanity, wanting to contribute, to help. “So that others may live” (U.S. Coast Guard Rescue Swimmers) this is my favorite quote and describes what I want to do. I came here to serve and this is the kind of service that I want to do. I want to reach down and get that victim that no one else can get, that no one is fast enough or strong enough to get, I want to reach down and get them.(The Guardian) To rescue someone from near or sure death and bring them back to their families, to me, in my mind, that is the ultimate mitzvah.
I’m sure if you are reading this, you have read either some or all of my previous posts so you might or might not remember the story about the kids in Haifa from the nursery, but I just wanted to let everyone know that I still think about those kids; and I think if one of them was in trouble or hurt I would want to be the one that came to help, and that is why I choose to make the choices I make. To take the consequences of being in this unit, being disconnected from my friends and family, not using my full rights as lone soldier (going home for a month every year), not going to the opening ceremony of the next Garin Tzabar year because I am busy doing training that will help me get to that end game.
I have a thousand stories I could probably share about the time between when I last wrote, but the most important thing that needs to be heard and expressed is what I have just addressed, so for now I will leave it at that. But know that I will keep on trucking and that all your thoughts, prayers and love are helping me enormously and giving me a lot of strength—so keep sending them.
May god bless you and keep you safe,
Shabbat shalom from Israel.
Always,
אנדרו
