Do you know that feeling when you just need to write?
Not because you have something profound to say.
Not because you’re trying to explain anything.
Just because the words feel like they need somewhere to go.
I’ve been feeling that a lot this week.
Maybe it’s because everything around us changed so quickly.
The war with Iran started almost suddenly. Of course we had been hearing about it for months, reading headlines, listening to analysts saying it might happen. But somehow, even when you try to prepare yourself mentally, you never really believe it will become reality.
Yet last week, something inside me quietly felt that something was about to shift.
Every afternoon when I left my office, right before the weekend began, I would look around my desk differently than usual.
At my notebook.
At the calendars hanging on the wall.
At the planner where I write down my daily tasks and circle the days that have passed.
And I caught myself thinking something strange:
When will I write here again?
It felt like I was saying goodbye to those small routines, the simple rhythm of workdays, meetings, plans, lists.
I didn’t know then that just a few days later, that feeling would make sense.
The Alarm That Turned Morning Into Something Else
The war started at 8 a.m. on a Saturday morning.
Not with news headlines.
Not with announcements.
With an alarm.
The kind that blasts through your phone with a sound so sharp it pulls you out of sleep instantly, the kind of sound that turns whatever dream you were having into something darker.
I woke up next to my boyfriend, confused and disoriented. For a second I didn’t understand what was happening.
Then my body did.
My nervous system went into complete shock. I woke up from deep sleep so suddenly that I felt a migraine explode in my head within minutes.
Sirens.
Phone alerts.
People running to the shelter.
And me, standing there with this unbearable pain in my head, feeling like I couldn’t even breathe.
The only thought that kept repeating in my mind was:
This is not fair.
Of course we all suffer from this in Israel. This is our reality as a country. But at that moment I wasn’t thinking about politics or war or strategy.
I was thinking about the pain in my body.
The kind of pain that makes everything else disappear.
The Shelter
My boyfriend stayed calm.
He guided me through the pain, helping me breathe slowly between alarms.
Inhale.
Exhale.
One siren ended, another alert came minutes later. On that first day, I honestly don’t even remember how long we spent in the shelter.
At first I was overwhelmed by something small but very real: the people.
I didn’t know what kind of environment we were about to enter.
What kind of neighbors he had.
What the atmosphere would be like.
Would people be tense? Quiet? Awkward?
But something surprising happened.
They were warm. Immediately warm.
The kind of people who make space for you without asking questions.
As the rockets kept coming and we kept going back down together, something slowly shifted inside me.
I started talking.
Then laughing.
Then sharing small stories.
And the migraines started fading.
The more I talked with them, the more I felt my body relax. My nervous system slowly settled. The tension in my head softened.
Being there with my boyfriend beside me and these neighbors, people I had never met before, I suddenly realized something very simple.
We were all in the same boat.
Conversations in the Shelter
Once the fear softened a little, the conversations became strangely ordinary.
We talked about where we were the last time tensions with Iran escalated.
Someone asked what grade we were in when we were in third grade, first or second. We debated it for ten minutes like it was the most important historical question.
At one point someone even opened a bottle of wine.
One of the neighbors had a birthday that same day, the day the war started, and we decided that if we were going to be stuck underground together, we might as well celebrate.
So there we were.
A group of strangers in a bomb shelter.
Drinking wine.
Laughing.
Talking about childhood memories.
It felt like a strange kind of family.
An unexpected one.
The kind you didn’t know you needed until it appeared.
Family Far Away
My own family lives in the south.
This war caught me in Tel Aviv, staying at my boyfriend’s apartment.
We spoke constantly through FaceTime that first week, checking on each other, sharing updates, making sure everyone was safe.
That’s the kind of family we are.
Loving. Protective. Always there when it matters.
Even when distance separates us.
A New Routine
Now, about a week into the war, life has settled into something strange.
We’ve become used to the sirens.
Used to waking up in the middle of the night.
Though I have to admit, the alarms at night still terrify me.
Usually there are two alerts.
The first one gives you time to prepare.
The second one means you need to run.
Both are equally frightening.
No matter how much I try to mentally prepare myself, I still jump every time they go off.
So my boyfriend came up with a solution:
I give him my phone before we go to sleep.
That way I don’t wake up to the alert sound directly next to my ear.
And of course, he was right.
Life, But Not Quite
Now we both work from home.
Two laptops open at his work table, trying to keep up with work while the outside world feels uncertain.
We answer emails. Join meetings. Complete tasks.
But there’s always a small awareness in the background: it might take a while before things feel normal again.
Then again… I’m not even sure what normal means anymore.
Since 2020, since COVID, Israel has faced wave after wave of instability.
Wars.
Threats from multiple fronts.
Iran.
The Houthis.
Hezbollah in the north.
Hamas.
Sometimes it feels like history is moving faster than we can emotionally process.
The Strange Calm of Uncertainty
Yesterday some restrictions were eased.
Technically we could go back to the office.
But honestly? I’m not sure I’m ready yet.
Tel Aviv has been heavily targeted, and something in me still prefers the safety of being close to the shelter.
For now, our mornings begin with coffee, laptops, and sometimes the distant sound of sirens.
And I find myself missing something very small.
Those lazy mornings when my boyfriend and I would wake up at 11 a.m., slowly starting the day without alarms, without urgency.
Just sunlight and quiet.
What This Week Taught Me
This week reminded me how quickly life can shift.
One day you’re writing tasks in your planner.
The next day you’re running to a shelter with strangers who suddenly feel like family.
But it also reminded me of something else.
Even in uncertainty, people find ways to soften reality.
A conversation.
A shared laugh.
A glass of wine in the most unlikely place.
Maybe that’s our quiet superpower here.
Not that we aren’t afraid.
But that somehow, even inside shelters, even during sirens, we still manage to build small moments of normal life.
And sometimes, those moments are enough to help us breathe again.
