It has been a couple of weeks since returning from Israel and I keep thinking about what it was like day to day on the trip. I think about how excited I felt when I woke up every day. I think about how happy I was traveling with new irreverent pals. I think about how relieved I felt laying down wherever I was at the end of the day to get some rest. Although I get to experience all of these feelings back at home, I don't get to feel the magnitude of those emotions. The light here is at a dull luminosity and even though I want to turn it up, the memories feel better than the reality.'

So how do I take the lessons from Israel and incorporate them in America? For one thing, I know on a conscious level that I can create the feelings I want from the inside out. I can, at the very least, carry around curiosity and excitement throughout my day. I have been attempting to do this but it is definitely a struggle. I figure the challenge I face here is being deliberately grateful and precocious day to day until it becomes natural. Being around little kids like my friends newborns and my baby cousins because they are naturally interested and delighted by just about everything. I have to make it a priority now to do something, see something or feel something I have never experienced before at least once before I go to sleep everyday in honor of my birthright experience.

I miss the friends I made on the trip. Texting is not enough. Its like reliving high school when everyone went off to separate colleges. I love my life at home, I just want to incorporate everyone I love here too. Make it nice and easy. Life should be easy and fun. I am done with all the noise and disappointment. I am ready for new and exciting.