What a strange moment in time this is, although maybe they are all strange and I am just seeing it more clearly right now. I really don’t know. Most of the time, I have my own set of worries that travel like an endless loop, cycling through my thoughts when I am not otherwise occupied. Of course, they are always ready for prime time in the middle of the night.

The worries are my litany, my recitation of those things I am concerned about in my life. The list is almost always family and work and friends and the ways in which I feel I need to do something more or different. I’ve gotten pretty good at visualizing that loop like the rack at the dry cleaners, with each nagging item having a number and a hanger of its own. And I’ve worked hard to make myself push the stop button and turn off that rotating rack, at least for a while.

But now, the concerns that so many of us feel about the safety of Israel, the plight of the hostages, the murder of innocents and an uncertain resolution, are never far from my thoughts. And they cannot hang on the dry cleaning rack and take their turn to be primary. Those thoughts are there all the time, those worries are an undercurrent with every pulse and every breath, pushing for primacy among the stresses of daily life.

It feels a bit like a game of ping pong between the concerns of every day and the concerns that are more global in scope. I check the Jerusalem Post notifications on my phone at 2 a.m. and am at the same time worried about my grandson who just was diagnosed with COVID. I think about the faces of those who have lost their lives in massacres, the images of children and young people and families and feel an ache for their families and, at then go back to focusing on a work situation that I need to address.

All of it matters. Life goes on both globally and personally and perspective, while vital, is not always within our reach. I have not figured out how to silence the ping pong match and, perhaps, I cannot. Perhaps all I can do is acknowledge the fears, give them their due and strive to live, and help others to live, with a full heart.