Change

Leaving the apartment I have been renting for the past 9 years, the neighborhood which has been almost like a home to me for so long. The landlord raised the rent considerably, and coupled with my own inner feeling of a few months ago that it is time to make a change, I've decided to answer the call and do what I feel G-d wants me to do - change and move on. It is so hard to live on rent, to not own an apartment of my own. But for someone like me it is practically impossible to buy an apartment - I need to have 30% of the apartment total cost before I can take mortgage and I'm not even remotely close to this. I teach private lessons in Hebrew to supplement my salary, to be able to save as much as I can, but it would never be enough to save that initial sum. Anyway, I'm greatly thankful for what I have - for my health, for my work, for the classes I teach as well, for the food I eat, for my friends and acquaintances, for meriting to live in Jerusalem, even if alone, for meriting to witness the Redemption of Israel, and for everything I have within my mind and in my life, which is a lot.

I have so many mixed feelings - expectations for the future together with fears of loneliness in a different neighborhood, far away from my own. In a way, it's like going back home, because I'm moving to a neighborhood in which I used to live when I was a university student. But I hardly know anyone there, and I so need a home, not just a house or an apartment...

But what makes me feel good about this move is that I feel like HaShem is trying to "tell" me in every possible way that I should move, now, and to that specific area. Not sure why, but I trust Him. I also merited to do an act of kindness by deciding on this move - the previous tenant left it after four and a half years in the middle of his yearly contract, and couldn't find anyone to replace him. He was paying without living there. The fact that I go in to live there is a big help for him. Amazingly, it was the first apartment I looked at and liked it, and even when I looked at other apartments later for comparison, I couldn't find anything else at all. So despite the natural fears and mixed feeling, I place my trust in G-d and let Him lead me. We'll see what He plans. A friend of mine told me that He sends me there for a mission, and that I'll find out what that mission is when I'm there. I liked it. I definitely feel that my life here in Rechavia was like this - many, many good things started and came into the world thanks to me being here and meeting the beautiful people that I got to meet. I believe that if HaShem sends me to Giv'at HaMivtar/Ramat Eshkol, then He probably has a plan for me there. We'll see. I allow myself to cry to release some tension. The packing is emotionally taxing - coming in touch with all those memories, getting rid of things that were mine for years, deciding what to give away and what to leave for myself, etc. I wish I could travel light - just my clothes and some books, but there are other things that I cannot throw away. I've learned that the method of buying books no longer serves me. I have so many, and without a permanent apartment of my own, it's just not fun to have so many. I went back recently to borrowing books in a library. 

I miss home.