My husband and I had recently joined the ranks of empty nesters. We kept hearing about our friends’ fascinating travel excursions and were feeling a lot of peer pressure. My sisters and their husbands visit a different country every year. Friends of ours recently traveled to Paris with their grandchildren. Another just visited Africa to see the gorillas, and one couple we know took a bike trip in the wine country of Northern California. It was high time we caught the travel bug and made our “have to see” bucket list.

But my husband and I have some kind of mysterious resistance to the travel bug. My parents were world travelers, so I’d been to five European countries in my youth. My husband had traveled after graduating college. Perhaps that had strengthened our immunity? Neither of us grew up in religious homes, and our youthful travel experiences felt like something from our secular past, something that no longer had the same value. We’d discussed our lack of motivation to travel, many times over the years.

“Do you think there’s something wrong with us?” I’d wonder.

“No. Who decided traveling the world was so important?”

“Isn’t it? Hashem made a big, beautiful world. Doesn’t He want us to see it?”

“It’s much easier to watch a National Geographic video.”

“Oh, come on. You know that’s not the same thing. Besides, everyone’s traveling.”

“You know what I say about that.”

“I know… we’re not everyone. But it might be good for us to shake up our routine a little, venture out of our comfort zones. We’re such creatures of habit.”

“Habits are good if they’re good habits.”

“True. But they say traveling is good for marriage.”

“Hmm… could be.”

We finally agreed to “hop on board,” and chose Hawaii for its closer proximity and relative ease. A few people recommended Kauai, the least populated and most authentic island. I booked two airline tickets for May and reserved a hotel.

That was before October 7, which made a Hawaiian vacation unthinkable. I tried to cancel our tickets but discovered I would only be offered a 12-month credit for the same trip. So I held on to the tickets, pushing it to the back of my mind. Days, weeks, and months passed. Our hearts were breaking. Like everyone, we cried, prayed, and said Tehillim for our brethren. We sent money. We considered traveling to Israel, but our son got engaged during our national tragedy, and we needed to be here.

Seven months into the war, grief was always in the air, but life continued. There were vorts and weddings, brissim and upsherens, bar and bas mitzvahs and basketball practice.

Pesach arrived and filled my house with children and grandchildren. In the weeks before Pesach, as I cleaned and cooked, I thought of those tickets to Hawaii. I’d almost certainly be ready for a vacation, but with the promised military offense in Northern Israel escalating, was it right?

I spoke to a friend living in Israel who reported that people were trying to live their lives as normally as possible. Restaurants were filling up again, people were out and about. She was playing Pickleball, davka!

Dejection and despair were not an option. We decided to use our tickets.

We were welcomed to the hotel with orchid leis and a view from the lobby that looked surreal. The air was rich and ripe with the tropical aroma of gardenias, plumeria, and hibiscus. We unpacked, then downloaded an app that offered prerecorded tours, and took off in our rental car.

We explored the island’s south Poipu shore. The next day, we toured the famous Kauai Coffee plantation and Waimea Canyon where volcanic eruptions formed tall mountains and bogs, deep canyons, and rivers. Experiencing it live couldn’t compare to a NatGeo video.

On Monday night we sat on our small balcony overlooking the beach. Many couples like us (older, retired) strolled along the quiet island road that ran parallel to the oceanfront. In recent months, my husband and I coined the term “wink-winks” for our incognito comrades because we’d smile and say hello as they passed, then turn to each other and wink. We fully appreciated that we weren’t the only ones enjoying a hike or taking a walk during the hours in the day that best avoided crowds and rush hour.

On our third night, as we discussed the next day’s activities, I noticed a new feeling creeping up. Something in the neighborhood of antsy. I wanted to don my tichel and not worry about looking too Jewish. I wanted to do something a little more purposeful, such as babysit my newest grandchild, or check in on a friend going through tough times. The locals here were friendly and fellow tourists were nice enough, but I wanted to be back in my own neighborhood. I wanted to shop in my kosher market. Shabbos was coming, and I wanted to get my usual early start.

Turning to my husband, I asked, “Should we see if we can change our tickets and leave tomorrow?”

Not skipping a beat he said, “Yes.”

The next morning, we used our few remaining hours to walk along the beachfront road with the other wink-winks. At a rocky cove we spotted a family of sea turtles being pulled by the gentle swell of waves, their heavy bodies rising and falling with the tide. Everyone who passed stopped to watch the slow and simple beauty of these old sea creatures, doing their natural thing, here in this ocean, on this island. I was feeling a lot like those turtles. I wanted to be doing my own natural thing, in my own waters where I belonged.

We sat for one last time in the hotel lobby, breathing in the tropical aroma of what some people call paradise. We are not some people. We are us. We like home. We like the simple purpose of our everyday lives. Sometimes, we even like boring.

But more than that, our idea of paradise is being where we can feel the heartbeat of our people.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 902)