Tomorrow will be two weeks since we moved to Italy. I’m realizing now that when I made the announcement on IG many thought I meant we moved for the summer. I wouldn’t call that moving. Our move may come as a surprise to some but its something that E and I and our kids have talked about at nauseam for YEARS. If you have been following on this blog you know that six years ago we left NYC to travel the world and find somewhere else to live. After making a full circle around the globe we ended up in Princeton, NJ haha! BUT I love Princeton! We moved to Princeton having never been there before, knowing only one other family and in five years Princeton became home, for me and the kids, less so for E. But even while we were enjoying our small town American life, we never felt settled for good and always wondered where to next. We spent summers exploring places like Copenhagen (where we love and really thought we wanted to move), Rome (which will always hold a special place in my heart, but has also changed a lot in 20+ years). There was one place we always came back to. A place that we always said eventually this is where our journey will end… Tel Aviv. As Jews, Israel is our only home. This is maybe a longer post for another time, but that is truly how I feel. And so on a long hot hike one august morning, I said to E, “why put off Israel for the future, for the right time, lets just do it!” E is actually Israeli, he has no romantic notion of Israel, but he really couldn’t argue with the rest of us. And so that was the plan, Summer 2024 we were making Aliyah. We were moving to Israel. It is actually painful to even remember the BEFORE time. The hope, optimism, and excitement I felt. I was finally coming home and putting down roots. And then October 7th happened, and our world shattered in more ways than one. Again, maybe a post for another time. But we sat in our kitchen in Princeton, and said “where do we go now?” Back to the drawing board we went. Italy was the easy answer. It’s a country E and I have both loved since we were in school. We both studied Italian and spent time in school here. We have visited many times since having kids; we have some friends here (although none in Trieste); the culture feels very familiar and comfortable for us; the food; quality of life; I can go on and on. If Italy, then where? This is actually a harder question than one may think. We had some criteria, which made the decision easy for us. We wanted to be in the north, milder weather (no crazy heatwaves) and better infrastructure. We wanted to be on the water. And all things considered, we wanted there to be some Jewish community. Trieste was the only logical choice. Only problem; we have never been here before, oh and we also didn’t even know anyone from here or who lives here. NO problem! Because in case you haven’t guessed, we are crazy!
I feel like I’m writing this post and not answering all the difficult questions. But why? Why would you leave a place where you have community and your kids are settled and happy? I guess the short answer is because we can. Because why not. Because we can always come back. I spent a lot of time trying to justify our decision to well meaning friends who asked me these exact questions. I would often make the mistake of talking about all the things I didn’t like about America at this moment. But that’s not fair. Italy is not perfect, and we did not leave because we think Italy is better. We left because Italy is hopefully a better fit for us right now; because this is an adventure; because my kids get to learn another language and travel around Europe; and yes, because it puts us closer to Israel, and if I can’t live there I want to be able to visit more often.
How? How are we able to do this. 1. E works from home. He has clients but he is his own boss. We have spent 3 summers coming to Europe for extended periods of time, so he kind of tested out this work schedule, and its manageable. 2. E is going back to school. He actually applied to a few programs at different Universities here in Trieste, and he’s starting a super cool AI masters program in the fall.
Ok, I feel like this post has gone on and on. I hope I answered some of the more pressing questions. I would love to hear from anyone reading this. I’m happy to answer more. Hopefully I will start blogging more often so it won’t feel long and overwhelming each time I sit down to write.
I just want to end with, we don’t know what we are doing! I don’t want to give off any delusion that we are experts on anything. We are doing our best, following our hearts, and figuring out along the way.
