This piece was written in the summer break, vacation or
holiday, however you like to call it. Chol Hamoed is the
Torah mandated `break' from routine, that breath of fresh
air, when many of us go to the lap of nature to marvel at the
beauty of Hashem's world, to drink it into our souls for the
grey, long winter ahead. To plug out of the manmade concrete
world and into the natural one.
As they say, memories are forever.
With a flap of its wings, the bird landed. One hardly ever
notices sparrows, even pigeons, absorbed as we adults are in
our reveries, as we walk down the street.
The daily grind of life was taking its toll on me. Bills
waiting to be paid, anxieties and disappointments weighing
down. The daily routine was getting monotonous.
A pair of bright, fascinated eyes follow the bird's
progress with wonder. Standing on the garden gate, his
cherubic little face glowing with anticipation, he flails his
little arms about and is soon rewarded for his efforts. The
bird soars skywards as the child dances a delighted jig,
enraptured by the graceful beauty and magic of flight.
The grey cement tenement blocks that line the street seem to
cram you in on all sides. Through the misery of the summer
heat, you note absently, almost begrudgingly, that it really
is a beautiful day.
With little to occupy him now, the child has moved on to
his second most favorite pastime.
"Hello!" a little voice pipes up. You look up, genuinely
surprised and amused. Your smile of appreciation warms the
heart of the little hero. For a minute, you get a glimpse
into the friendly, ingenuous world of a carefree child.
As you walk on, the load on your shoulders becomes a little
lighter. Your encounter with the child has touched you
somewhere deep down, for you, too, were once a child, just
like that. In truth, part of you must still be. As you walk
along, you feel a small pang of longing for a lost world of
innocence, purity, seeing the world through transparent un-
glasses in its everyday beauty and fascination. You square
your shoulders to face the adult humdrum world.
Out of habit, you tell yourself to keep going and not
slacken, when what you really need, more than anything else,
is a vacation.
You may be feeling a little baffled, though, as to what
constiutes a vacation. Some hideaway in hi- tech-land? With
all the fuss raised about the wonders of computers, we might
believe that therein lies the solution to all the world's
problems. The truth is very far -- as far as you can distance
yourself -- and as close as you can get back to the real
thing.
I recaptured some of the lost innocence, the childlike
vision, as I looked out to sea, spellbound. I had completely
forgotten the awe it inspires. I had gone to Netanya for
Shabbos and was standing in the shul, waiting for
mincha. Through the window, I watched the red sphere
of the sun edging its way towards the horizon, where sea and
sky meet, its progress actually visible at this Eretz Yisroel
latitude. No book, no written description could ever match a
viewer's appreciation of the vastness and beauty of Hashem's
vista-world. And my ensuing mincha was much the richer
for having tuned into that spectacle.
The sea seemed to beckon, for at four in the morning I found
myself wide awake, having slept like a baby to the lullaby of
the night-tide. Now I was restless.
I got up and few moments later, I was negotiating the dark
stairs leading down to the sea. The loose sand impeded my
progress but I soon found myself on firm sand as I approached
the sea.
The air was warm and humid. I had never heard the sea so loud
before as it crashed and roared itself into smithereens, wave
after frothy wave.
I turned to walk northward, moving at a steady pace. It
occurred to me that I was walking in the footsteps of the
spies that Moshe had sent, thousands of years before. They,
too, had walked up the north of Eretz Yisroel along this
beach. Had they moved along the packed sand by the edge of
the sea, in the middle of the night, as well, when the native
Canaanites were sleeping?
I continued on, walking as close to the sea as possible. The
faint glow coming from the moon and stars glistened on the
wet sand, clearly demarcating a dividing border between sea
and sand, along the guidelines of Creation.
I felt I was treading a magic line where daring waves raced
up to me, stopping just short of my feet.
The throb of the sea drowned out any other sound: the patter
of my feet and the inner beat of my pulse. Visibility stopped
short beyond the few meters of wet, moon-glowing sand ahead.
I almost felt like I was floating along, at one with the
sea.
I was, I finally realized, on VACATION.
In the urban world in which most of us live, dominated by
man-made machines, deadlines, phone lines, on-line, asphalt
whitelines, newspaper by- lines and all that between-the-
lines of daily stress -- vacation time constitutes just
peeping out of the narrow concrete confines for a while to
sense some of the vastness of the natural wonder and splendor
in Hashem's world around us.
There, amidst the seas, rivers, streams -- by Hashem's water
spots -- and in the mountains and valleys -- one can once
again concentrate on the Creator and His creations. And drink
in the majesty that proclaim and reflect His own . . .
Relaxed and serene, we may even awake to the inner beauty of
those most close to us, whom we so often take for granted,
whom we keep on hold, on a busy line.
Reduced to size in the panaroma of nature, we may even be
able to peel off some of the thick layers of self-
sufficiency, self-preoccupation, perhaps simple apathy, to
dig deeper and connect to our own neshomos.
Perhaps we can rediscover, recapture, that fresh innocence
and wonder of a child watching a bird in flight.
