This is the last post in the series. In my next post I’ll return to what this blog was supposed to be about – writing and social anxiety. Not that this post has nothing to do with social anxiety….
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Leaving the HP sauce behind (because D informed me that he found a source for the sauce), I carry my case and rucksack downstairs and have a quick breakfast before setting out. M2, in the last of many good deeds, is up and dressed, and she drives me to the station at some unearthly hour.
All the trains run to time, and I’m soon taking a last look at the back of the house I lived in for twenty years as my train whizzes past.
My mind is on my luggage, wondering whether it’ll pass the weight limit, when an El Al security person calls me over for the usual chat. You know, who packed your luggage, was it with you all the time. It’s very noisy in the airport, and I haven’t had much sleep. I’ve never had any trouble with the security check before, but this time, she’s worried. She says I seem hesitant.
I try to think of a normal-sounding excuse. “I haven’t spoken Hebrew for six weeks.” A bad idea. She wants to repeat the whole procedure in English. “No. I understood it all. I packed everything and it was with me all the time.”
Fortunately, she lets me go. Otherwise I might have had to mention the dreaded words: social anxiety.
And that’s it. My case weighs 20.2 kg, which is apparently OK. I heave my heavy rucksack onto my sleep-deprived body and follow all the usual procedures until I finally end up in the arms of D, who takes me back home. Because, while London and the other places feel very familiar, Jerusalem is my real home and I’m glad to be back.
Miriam Drori, Author 