Well, here we go again. Tonight and tomorrow are Tisha B’av – the saddest time on the Jewish calendar.
It’s always a struggle to “make myself sad” so I can appropriately commemorate this day. Not this year, though.
It’s usually tough to conjure up feelings of wistfulness about our nation’s eventual return, unified, to our Land. Not this year, though.
Sometimes it’s hard to imagine our land full of dead and wounded. Not this year, though.
It can be a stretch, at the height of summer, to pause from our revelry, from our swimming, from dancing at weddings, from outdoor barbecues – to focus on loss and pain. Not this year, though.
At one time it seemed a bit overblown to state that we were surrounded by enemies who wished to see us dead. Not this year, though.
And ultimately? It has, at some points in my life, been difficult to truly pray for life to change, to bring in its wake better times, peaceful times, happy times.
Not this year.
May this be the last Tisha B’av – this year, and any year.