New Arising

New Arising

It was a nice summer day in Tel Aviv. Orit and Ayelet were talking to each other as they walked toward the restaurant. They met up with their friends Ari and Erez who were waiting. Ari ordered a burger as well as Erez. Orit and Ayelet ordered fish. They sat down at the table and were talking about their experiences in the army. They were on leave recently, but going back next week. They were glad to have some vacation from it. While short, it was still something. One of them said that they should do a documentary about it.

'Hey, guys lets do a video of our army experiences.' Erez said.
'What do you mean, Orit asked.
'Well you know, talk about our daily life in the army and the ups and downs.'
'Sounds interesting' Ayelet said.
'We can do it with my camera' Ari said. They spoke some more and then left.

The week went by quickly and was almost over. Ari was on his phone while going to the store to buy a few things. “So glad the weekend is almost here.” He said to Erez.
“Yea. Erez replied. I‘m definitely ready to relax.”

That evening on Thursday, the two guys meet outside at Ben Yehuda st. in Tel Aviv. Then Orit and Ayelet walk by. They start working on the video. "How should we start this?' Ari asked.
"I don't know, maybe one of us can go first and then another one goes.' Orit suggested.
"Okay, I'll go first.' Ayelet said.
She waits for Ari to tell her when to start, then tells about her experiences. Nothing too specific or personal, just things like on one of the days, she had to stitch up someone who was badly hurt. He lost a lot of blood, but he survived, thank G-d
Next Erez went and told about how he and Ari were on guard duty and then saw a something strange go into a building and went to check it out.
It turned out to be nothing, but now they were stuck in a dangerous building and needed to carefully get out of there. Ari and Orit also told their story of their own experiences. Then, they turned off the camera.
“That’s a good start for the video.” Ari said.
The four of them then walk around and go into a pizza shop to eat.

The weekend came and the friends went to a dance club and greeted other friends there. It‘s an experience that gives you such a high. It felt good to let go and have fun.

Later they put their documentary on Youtube but the comments were negative, with a little supportive ones.

During the week, Erez and a two other soldiers were walking down the street in a small town near Tel Aviv. They were chatting with each other and laughing. Then they heard a sound and was wondering what that was. They walked slowly and headed toward the sound.
They weren't sure where it came from. They went around to a certain street. When they didn't find anything in particular, they started to turn back. Then one of them noticed something. It was just a small firecracker. "This is probably what we heard." Erez said. They were all relieved it was just that.

Orit was with a patient stitching up a wound. She conversed with him and found out about him and his family. 'There you are done.' She said.
'Todah' He replied. She went to take a break and grab some coffee. She daydreamed about traveling the world. She are Ayelet had spoken before about going to India, Italy, and other places. Then she refocused and came back to work. She enjoyed being a nurse and taking care of people. She learned a lot about the patients and their lives and sometimes heard some interesting stories.

Ari and Erez were back at the base talking to each other. 'What do you want to do after army service?' Ari asked.
Erez replied, I don't know, maybe college, or travel or something. What about you'?
"Maybe publish some songs, and go to school."
Another soldier they know, Chaim, was there too. “Cool idea, publishing songs.” Chaim said.
Erez asked, “What do you want to do?”
Chaim replied, “Well now I’m doing both army and learning. After I want to continue learning and also work with computers like web design.”
-
On Friday afternoon, the two guys and two ladies did another video. Later that evening, they went to the club around 8PM. After a awhile, they started walking down the street. While walking, they saw a man with a beard and hat walking with another man.
The man with a beard said hi to them. They said hi back. "Do you remember me?" He asked. They looked at him and had no idea who he is. "It's me, Daniel Geffen."
"Danny, what happened?" Ari asked.
"I became religious."
His friends were speechless.
"Wow, we didn't recognize you." Ari said.
"What made you decide to do that?" Erez asked.
"Come over and I'll tell you the story."  Daniel said.
They were still bewildered.
“Um, sure.” Erez said. The others nodded.
"Don't worry, we'll catch up. It will be fun.“ Daniel said. “And I live close by."
Daniel was a little older and settled down. When they entered the house, it was very serene and peaceful. Daniel introduced them to his a wife and two year old daughter.
They came to the table which had a couple other guests also. Daniel said kiddush, and they stood.
While eating, they caught up on what's going on in each other's life. Then Daniel gave a Dvar Torah. Afterwards, they sang zemiros. The enjoyable, peaceful atmosphere enveloped them and felt heavenly.


During the week, Ari was on guard duty and thinking about the meal they had at Daniels house. The spirit of that day stayed with the group the rest of the week. He and his friends weren't really into the whole religious thing, but it was nice catching up with a friend they haven't seen in awhile.

Ayelet got to know many of the patients, who they are, who their family is, what their interests are etc. Some cases were the usual kind, someone is injured or ill and needs treatment. And some were different. Ayelet was working with a certain patient and was asking about them as usual. “What’s your name?“ She asked.
He tried to think but couldn’t come up with anything. “I don’t know.” He said bewildered.
She ask him some questions, but he couldn’t answer. He lost his memory. She looked to find some form of ID and found it. Hopefully, this can help them find his family.
“Don’t worry, we’ll find your family.”
She reassured him that hopefully with some time, his memory will come back.


The week went by and the group was planning to do their usual. Do their video either Thursday evening or Fri afternoon, and later go to the club and dance. - That Friday at about 2PM, their friend Daniel called Erez and asked if they would like to come again. Erez asks his friends,
"Do you want to come to Daniel's house again?"
"Ah, I don't know, should we?" Ayelet asks.
"Well we had a good time last time, right?" Orit said.
"Yeah, we did." Ari said.
The friends agreed.
"Okay we‘ll come." Erez said.

They went to the club first just to talk to a few people. Afterwards, they headed towards Daniels house.
They ate and sang and then Daniel spoke about the parsha. Ari asked him a question. Daniel answered and gave some information. The group asked questions about the parsha, then about Torah in general. There were many things that they didn't understand, and they shared their thoughts with him. He cleared up some things for them and gave them some information to fill the gap and help them understand. It was great information, but it also was a lot to take in and they weren't sure whether or not they wanted to.

Erez and Ari were given an assignment to go with a group to the south. It reminded Erez of a dream he had before.
He told Ari the dream. "The four of us were in the negev just wandering around and relaxing. It was really hot and and we were running out of water. A while later, I thought I saw something and so I went to see what it was. You all followed. It looked like water. We all thought it did. We tasted it but it was different. Too sandy. Our hope was gone. We traveled some more and then saw someone coming. He asked if we are okay. We told him the situation and he gave us some water. After satisfying our self, we wondered, where did he come from? Then I woke up."
"That's some dream."
"yes."
They walked around in the small neighborhood and then someone came up to them and gave them a small piece of paper. It said, 'Don't get involved.' They wanted to know who it's from but the person left. "What are they talking about?" Erez asked.
"I don't know." Ari answered.

Later, they come back from their trip.
Few days go by, the two guys visit Daniel at a coffee shop. They talk while drinking coffee. "So Daniel, how is work going?"
Erez asks. "It’s good. Daniel replies. I'm working on placing a new coffee shop in town." "Cool." Ari said.
"Maybe you can give us some free coffee" Erez said. They all chuckled.
"Sure" Daniel replied.
"So what's up with you guys, still working on that video project?"
"Yep." Ari said. “It’s going well.”
“Very good.” Daniel said.

Daniel invited the four friends to come to some shiurim with him and they agreed.
At first, they didn’t really accept what was said. They had a general belief in G-d, yes. However, in regards to life, they wanted to live how they want. --- But after some time, the lectures started to have an impact.
They became more interested in this viewpoint and lifestyle. The lessons were an eye opener.
They continued coming to the shiurim, and to Daniel’s house for Shabbos.

Lag B’Omer was coming. Ari was on break and looked at his text message on his phone. It was from Erez. “Would you like to come to Meron this Lag B’Omer?”
He thought about it and wrote back, ‘Sure.’
They told Ayelet and Orit, and they also agreed to come with.

That day, they headed there and looked around. There was a huge crowd of people. “Hey, how are you?” Daniel said approaching them.
“Good.” They said.
“Nice turn out.” Erez said.
“Yeah, it’s great to see many joined together here.” Daniel said.
They spoke for awhile about different things in general, and then went to go sit by the bon fire. The fire danced as they sat around it. It was a nice chilled experience. Then they each started to sing. They closed their eyes and the whole thing seemed to put them in a spiritual trance. The feeling was otherworldly.

The following week, Erez got another message written on a note. He found it in his room and called Ari. “Again it says, ‘Don’t get involved. Leave before it’s too late.’ Erez read.
“This is very weird. Who could be sending this, what are they talking about?”
“I don’t know. But we need to find out.”

A few days later, after Erez’s shift was over, he was heading toward his quarters when a young man approached him. “I’m the one sending the messages.”
“Who are you.”
“My name is Avishai.”
“Why did you send this?”
“Because I don’t think you are doing the right thing.” The man replied.
“How do you know?”
“I’ve seen it. It happened to my friend. He took this direction and now he is living in a yeshiva dorm in Jerusalem. He is brainwashed and practicing archaic rituals.”
“Don’t you and your family come together for chagim and have a meal together?” Erez asked.
“That’s different.”
“How?”
“We can still do what we want. We are free.”

Later, while lying in bed, Erez thought about what does it really mean to be free. Was freedom the ability to do whatever you want? But then aren’t we a slave to desire? - But when we apply discipline, we control it and channel it in proper ways. Then, we are truly free.

Erez and his friends met at a Pizza shop and he told them about the conversation and then about the question about freedom.
Orit mentioned,
"I use to wonder how is it freedom if you don't do anything fun and enjoyable? However, we here do enjoyable things, just in a good way, like going to Meron to that bon fire."

Ari says, "I've come to realize that life is about purpose. However, we can have good fun within that purpose. Doing that itself, gives us pleasure"

"Speaking of which, Erez said, I was thinking that maybe we can do something like compose songs. What do you think?"

"Interesting idea. What would we do with it?" Ayelet asked.
"We can make song videos. Erez said. Ari and I, we know guitar.
Ayelet came in "Orit and I can do a song video for girls."

"Sounds good." Orit said. The others nodded.

"We can work on the lyrics when we are not busy, and later, like after our Army service is done, we can work on the videos."
Erez said.

The days went by and the group worked on the lyrics, each person writing something when they had the chance.

Ayelet was in the clinic helping the patients. One of the nurses came by and said, "It's sometimes hard looking at all
these patients and their pain."
"Yea." Ayelet said.

"It makes you wonder why?"

"There is a lot of pain, but there is also survival." Ayelet said.

"Yea, but it's still hard."

"I agree, it is very hard. But there is still hope." Ayelet said. "Some day, it won't be like this but we will have a world of tranquility."

"Do you really believe that." The nurse Naomi asked.

"Yes."

"I don't know, it sounds like a fantasy."

"It's not, it's a promise." Ayelet said.

"Well, I guess with a good politician and the spreading of peace education, it's possible." Naomi said.

"That's the problem. We have tried politicians and they have failed."

"Then what should we do?"

"The answer is there, so simple." Ayelet went with Naomi to a computer and showed her the references that mention about
how to have peace and blessing. "The requirement is that we follow Hashem ways and trust in Him. We need to do what we are meant to do."

"I don't know, can we trust a spiritual solution? Or would we be fooling our self."

"Has the physical solution worked so far?" Ayelet asked.

"At certain times, and we can still keep trying."

"Yea, in vain. Right now, we are sleeping. We need to wake up and realize what we need to do."


Avishai, who spoke to Erez earlier, was using the computer. Then he went to bed.
He found himself standing at a fork in the road, trying to decide which one to take.
Then something was coming towards him. He don't know what it is, but he needed to move fast. His heart racing, he moved forward, and then woke up.

Avishai tried to push the dream out of his head, but it kept surfacing.

Two days later, Erez was doing guard duty and then took off when his shift ended. Avishai saw him outside and told him his dream.

Erez thought about it and said, "You have a choice to make."

"What choice?"

Erez looked at him.

"You don't mean?" Avishai asked. "No I am not going down that path and getting caught up in that."

"Your choice. I know how you feel. I use to feel that."

"But now you are part of that world."

"It's better than you think. How about you come with me to a shiur or Shabbos meal?"

"I don't want to be dragged into this."

"fine, but you should at least give it a chance. By the way, why are you so against it?"

"I like to deal with reality."

"Exactly, that's what it is, a vehicle that connects us to reality" Erez said.
-

The group continued to each one work on the lyrics when any of them had the chance, and then shared it with each other.

After some time, their army service ended. The group travels to the United States for a couple months. They come back to Israel and Erez and Ari are now in a yeshiva and also working part time.
Orit and Ayelet are taking some college classes and working. The two guys, spend about a two hours a week on
their song video, as do the two ladies. Every month, they make a new video.

“What should we call our album?” Ari asked while on the phone.

"What do you think of New Arising?" Erez asked.

"Sounds good."

They designed the cover to show a plant rising from the ground and coming to the surface.

Orit and Ayelet discussed the name of their album. They mentioned different names and then Orit said,
“How about finding reality?”

“I like it.” Ayelet said.

The cover showed clouds with light shining through it.

Their albums came out in the stores and they started to play in front of an audience.

The ladies first performance was on Sunday night with a female audience. They had a good turnout. The singers felt good having a chance to uplift people in this way.

The guys first concert was on Monday night. Many also showed up and had a good time.

The four friends have reached a place where their soul can truly sing, but the journey continues on as others join with them.