longing

It is not that I have a great Interest in Mechanic, nor a Fascination for vehicels, It is a fascination which grows out of ignorance, a bewilderment; gaping at this wonder, a huge shiny metal aircraft floating in space. I also never fully understood how a car is moving on its own. Somehow the domane of machinery, is still foreign to me, even though it is so present in life. My fascination counts also for what it is standing for: a vehiclel, a power breaking through, enforcing itself, a winner. The way it slices the atmosphere, how it overcomes a great distance, and the roll it plays in my life. My parents, arriving in Israel sometime between 1936- 1943, in their wish to start a new page in life, they, neither felt the need to travel abroad, nor did they have the possibility to finance such a journey if they wanted to. They got very involved in the development of their new homeland, and distrusted any luxus. I did not. I envied my girlfriends who had more capitalistic families, who traveld abroad with their parents, who had a car. To have a car was a real sign of prestige, and every father who respected himself will be seen on saturday morning washing his car with a lot of water. My father was always enraged over the wasting of precious water. Saturday, was also a family visiting day. and we had to walk. Of´course they were also beautiful, those walks. Areas which today are completly built up used to be flower carpets. I was always in suspence, fear of meeting some kids who might know me while walking with my parents. For me, life was slow and full of poesie, I can appreciate it now I couldn´t as a teenager. Later, at the same time in which I mysteriously but definetly turning blond, I spent two full years on the back of one motor-bike or another, to the enragement of the whole neighbourhood who got realy distressed due to gangs of young bikers who used to sworm the street especially at the holly time between 14-16 o´clock:menuchat zohoraim (siesta time). Israel is a synonim for beautifull countryside, mellow pastel colours wonderfull light, political discussions , religion, and war. you get so used to the sight of military airplanes ; all the " Mirajes" and the "misters", like silver arrows in the white- blue sky, the white tails they leave behind them, showing theirselves off, the ultra- schall boom is a common sound in the sky of Tel- aviv but still It always make your heart miss a bit, at least it was like that for me. The memory of war, the awaiting in fear, of war. The six days war broke off at 1967, the yom- kipur at 1973, I was still a child, I never sufferd any loss, my memories of It is of exceitment, at last something extraordinary was happening, people were much more friendly to each other, the air was heavy with longing and in the radio they were playing sad and beautiful songs. Ofcourse we didn´t have a T.v at the time. At nights light rockets were to be seen at the darkness, and It was dark because of the neccesity to avoid all light being seen from the air. The egyptian radio from Kahir was giving us in hebrew to understand that ther airplanes are flighing over Tel-aviv. We were making jokes about It, but into the usuall glamour which is going hand in hand with flying, pilots and the whole of the aircraft dimension involved itself a new aspect: respect for the capacity of control and destruction. I often dream about airplanes, sometimes they apear as intimidating great black birds or as shiny metallic in the air floating great cameras, with red lights, like all-seeing eyes, a more modern version which is also due to later images for example, the police helicopter which often is circling the Berliner Himmel. One great difference between my parents andme and maybe it is a more general difference between the first and the second, post- war generation of eastern european jewish people is, that my parents were not interestet of leaving Israel,not even for a holliday, and I understand their reason and respect their desicion. I , was curios about everything which had to do with other continents . growing up in a country which phisically, because of geographical - political situation, does not have open borders I could normaly cross. but also because I was not realy supposed to be interested in other countries besides to how they stand in their relations to my country. The dream of open borders, of simply driving a car from one country to the next become obsessive. I used to stand at the very populated beach of Tel- Aviv,staring at the horizon,thinking romantic thoughts of overseas.* So I did what many young people are doing after two years of obeying orders in the obligatory military service;I went traveling. I booked my first flight to europe. I never planned to stay away, and sometimes I feel that I am still doing that same journey for the last twenty years. Airports and Airplanes; Cars, trains: Metro, underground U.Bahn. velocity, I hate it because it means stress,discontent, brutality, cruelty, pollution, noise, and it fascinates me in a way that one is fascinated by dissaster. It has an astetic, The shief world of reflections in car windows, thous, through speed transformd landscapes we can see while driving fast or through a window of a high speed train,The split second in which we grasp relativity . The view of the ever sunny land beyond the clouds and the earth which is fading away, a sight which for a short while make us raise our eyes from our newspapers, and gives us for a fleeting moment a feeling of elation, a philosophical perspective, a sardonic blick at our exaturated self importance. Yet, it is only for a moment; as faster is the rythem of life becomming, I am becomming more exasperated, less incapable of stilling my longing, but I am afraid that the knowledge that It Is no use competing with time, can not stop me trying to catch up with Its speed.

*I had a dream in which I was standing in front of a huge stage, me being very small, The screen was still closed, it was moveing lightly by a light breeze which came from somewhere behinde.It was made of an unknown material, maybe the stuff from which dreams are made of. It was glowing in the dark. I was to decide and my decision will be fatal; If I open the screen I will have to walk forwards into whatever is behinde It. I oppened It. There was the sea ....