As the calendar slowly approaches October 7, we at ISRAEL21c have started to reflect on the personal impact of the events that took place in Israel one year ago.

At first blush, I wasn’t sure there was anything much for me to write about it, from a personal perspective — it was nationally tragic, and the results of that are plain to see: people never respond to “how are you?” without a little shrug and a knowing look, public walkways and hotspots now share a common backdrop of yellow ribbons, kidnapped posters, and empty chairs lining sidewalks.

It’s a universal feeling in Israel, so I assumed that because we’re all so publicly immersed in it all the time, surely there’s not much to add.

But as I thought about it more, I realized there are actually quite a few moments in my day-to-day life that have become small but predictable triggers of more intense reflection on October 7 and the terrible things that have happened as a result of it.

Working out with guilt

As an example: I’ve been working out (not to brag, but my mom says that I look like a “big strong boy,” so I guess you could say it’s paying off).

The primary part of working out, for me, is fairly straightforward: three times a week I convince myself to stand in my bedroom and lift a heavy thing a few hundred times while I sweat and listen to a podcast.

The more complicated part is something I hadn’t anticipated, and that’s upping my intake of food and water to make sure I have enough fuel to effectively lift the heavy thing as many times as I’d like.

There are days when this has just become a part of my routine so I think nothing of it. Another glass of water, another quick snack, down the hatch and back to lifting that heavy thing.

There are other times, though, where a cruel juxtaposition flies to the forefront of my mind.

Here I am, worrying about how much extra food I can pile in, and keeping track of how many glasses of water I’ve had — while only 100 kilometers away, hostages who could have just as easily been me are being held against their will with no guarantee of their next meal.

This feeling of survivor’s guilt hits me hard, and there’s nowhere to put it. I wait for the discomfort to subside and distract myself with another podcast.

When a shower is triggering

On a similar note, taking a shower — once a pretty mundane act — has become another privilege checkpoint in my daily routine.

This time, I roil with guilt at having free access to something that I know isn’t available to the hostages — or for that matter, the homeless Gazan civilians or the Bedouins living with their electricity and water access strictly controlled by the government. 

If I somehow manage to push that feeling down, I tend to get stuck thinking about songwriting (a favorite hobby of mine.) 

Now, I don’t know why they only hit me in the shower, but they always do — a trickle of verses for an unwritten song about the baby, Kfir Bibas, being held captive in Gaza. I wonder if he knows what sunlight feels like. I wonder what his early childhood memories will be like. I wonder if his mother is saving any food for herself.

Checking on the kids

Before I go to sleep every night, I check on my little girls to make sure they’re okay and haven’t somehow managed to wrap a stuffed animal around their faces while they sleep.

They’re usually fine, though my younger daughter has a tendency to roll off her mattress (which is on the floor for this reason) and sleep with her arms in a karate pose, her feet propped up against the wall and her back on the cold floor tiles. To each their own — I sleep on my back like Count Dracula, so you can sleep like an action figure chucked into a toy box.

As I look at my daughters, there are nights when I am overwhelmed with a sense of wholeness and happiness that this family has grown around me.

There are other nights where the dread of that family ending in a single moment grips me and keeps me awake as I lie in bed.

On those nights, I eventually find something distracting enough to carry me to sleep. I hope the hostage men, women and families are getting enough sleep.

Moments of joy

Every year, my wife and I take turns making a photo album for each other to celebrate our anniversary in late August. This year was my turn, and I knew I had a daunting task ahead of me.

“How the hell am I going to make a positive album about this year, which has been the single most traumatizing of our lives?” I asked myself.

After meditating on it for a minute, I decided that the best thing to do, given what I’m able to do about the ongoing tragedy, is to focus on the moments of joy. The times that we managed to scrape together some happiness during such a dark time.

The country has had a terrible year. Being attacked, attacking back with questionable force and means, endless negotiations for the release of hostages met with disappointment and frustration, the stirrings of a new war in the North — there’s been so much bad this year.

I don’t know how it could be, and it’s almost pointlessly naive to suggest, but I hope that the people living through all of this — especially the people on both sides of the conflict who are most affected by it; the hostages, the homeless, the families huddled together in fear — can find any moments of joy to focus on. I wish it with everything I’ve got.

The album came out great; I hope Israel will too.