A Year's Time

Today marks a year since I left New York and a lot has happened since then. Here's what's changed:

I moved to Tel Aviv
Entered the Israeli startup scene
Fell in love with a guy
Married him
Visited 3 different countries
Found a great job
Did the honeymoon thing

When I think of the difference this year has made I am astounded by all that. Usually it's the silent swoosh of another year passing with accelerating speed that astounds me instead. This has been happening more or less since my 20s and throughout my 30s when school, semesters and summer vacations gave way to the flow of Life As Is. Milestones happened along the way but never so many that were so meaningful in the mere span of 12 fleeting months.

There's a nice saying that reminds us life is what you make it. Each day counts because even though 24 hours may pass in a flash they add up to 24 hours. And the next 24 hours after that. So what you do with that time matters, including working hard, eating right, loving well and taking leaps of faith. For me coming to Israel was a leap of faith.

So today, to mark my one year anniversary since I arrived, we went hiking. Or so that was the plan. Now that I've been in Israel one year and feel like I'm settling in I want to get back to the things I love from before. Art. Reading. Teaching Yoga. Hiking.

Used to be I hiked all the time. Upstate New York, Patagonia, Colorado, the Palisades, Nepal. I have a list I'm pretty proud of but I haven't hiked much since coming to Israel. So today was a sort of new beginning. Also it's Saturday, the Israeli "Day of Rest."

We picked Nahal Taninim which loosely translated from Hebrew means "Alligator River." Israel is a beautiful country, from its European-style rolling hills up North to its Biblical desert landscape down south. Nahal Taninim is somewhere in the middle, a noncommittal 30 minute drive from Tel Aviv in the Carmel region, near Haifa. The trail itself is small and full of other people who had the same idea about how to spend their day not resting. That's the thing about hiking in Israel. Israelis love their country and getting to know it is popular among outdoor enthusiasts, youth groups, families, and all other citizens alike. That makes for a lot of people on one trail in a country this small, especially when that trail is considered "family-friendly."

Nahal Taninim ends up being nothing like the hikes I've experienced before or what I imagined for the day. But we are with some friends so we don't stop there. We end up at another park after that, marvel at its beautifully landscaped grounds and gardens of fresh herbs, then end up at one of Tel Aviv's best steakhouses. By the time we sit down to eat we must've "hiked" about 3 km.

But for a one year anniversary celebration of sorts it isn't bad. Nothing like what I imagined it would be but fun and full of laughs. Fall is just beginning and a cool breeze helped temper the still hot sun. We saw an ancient Roman aqueduct and the steak was delicious.

Mostly, today was pure pleasure in a series of moments that wouldn't have existed if not for every step and every minute that came along the way. These 12 months before could have just passed me by but they brought me here, to this new previously unimaginable life that I love. As the writer Milan Kundera says,

"There is nothing more obvious, more tangible... than the present moment. And yet it eludes us completely. All the sadness of life lies in that fact."

We can grow heavy with such sadness. Or we can learn to take advantage of the "obvious." And revel in it.