BOULDER
When I began writing blogs I vowed I’d avoid politics. But the political has caught up with me and everyone I know. What made it especially personal was the murderous attack in a peaceful college town: Boulder, Colorado. My son and family live in a nearby town, so I know Boulder’s charming streets and lively cafes. What I couldn’t have imagined was that a group of peaceful residents demonstrating on behalf of the hostages held in Gaza would have lethal “cocktails“ thrown at them. The weapon was different, but the hatred was familiar.
The next day national news outlets, struggling for a new way to describe an almost daily national scene, came up with the same headline: American Jews Are Very Afraid.
Well, yes. You’d have to have just landed from another planet not to be afraid in this climate of hate. But fear isn’t limited to those who are Jewish. I have a Catholic friend who is terrified, and Muslim neighbors behind locked doors. Yet despite the public tendency to see any group as monolithic, we cope in individual ways. Some of us become stronger with anger, others try to protect ourselves by making our personal world small and keeping close to home. After all, we say, where is it safe? Boulder wasn’t even t even the first site of a Colorado attack – there had been a fatal one in a local market – and Boulder won’t be the last.
I confess I’m one of the the group that tries to be invisible. I’ve refused many invitations to meetings and concerts because I saw the locales as potential death traps. Even my Jewish neighbors, who customarily lit Chanukah candles and proudly displayed these images of a miracle in their windows, now keep the “Festival of Light” behind shuttered windows. We’re all more cautious about how we speak in public, how we dress. The Mogen David (Jewish star) jewelry we enjoy wearing is discreetly obscured by coverings, if worn at all.
I’m not advising anyone to throw caution to the political winds. But what makes me.really cringe is what we’re doing to ourselves. For if we allow fear to lock us in, aren’t we hostages, too?