By Betzy Lynch
LA JOLLA, California — My sister was visiting from Maine this Shabbat. As we drove home from synagogue on Saturday morning, she spoke to her child and said, “I’m sorry to miss the event you’re planning. I wish I could be there. But I still haven’t figured out how to be two places at once.”
Her words lingered with me, floating above the fullness of this remarkable week.
Last Sunday began with the arrival of the Oketz Unit from the IDF, here through our partnership with Peace of Mind. Run by Metiv, the Israel Psychotrauma Center in Jerusalem, Peace of Mind helps Israeli combat veterans, especially those from elite units, process their military experiences and transition more healthily into civilian life. The nine-month program culminates in a weeklong stay with a diaspora community, offering therapy, rest, recreation, and the warm embrace of Jewish connection.
Although our J has hosted groups before, this was the first time we served as the lead organization, providing for nearly all their needs: therapy space, meals, recreation, and volunteer host families. Thanks to the coordination of Nina Brodsky, Iris Pearlman, our JCC Board Chair Liz Coden, and the Community Engagement team led by Adam Nicolai, in partnership with Congregation Beth El, we met and exceeded expectations. Together, we welcomed these young men with the radical hospitality that defines San Diego’s Jewish community.
Within hours of the Oketz team’s arrival at the J, we opened a new exhibit in the Gotthelf Art Gallery: the vivid and deeply personal work of 98-year-old artist Bea Gold. Still painting and carving woodcuts, Bea captures nearly a century of memory and resilience. Her art is a visual memoir filled with family, friends, pets, and strangers, all woven into a tapestry of joy and connection. From her Brooklyn childhood and studies at the High School of Music & Art to her decades in Los Angeles, Bea has always created. This exhibition is not just a showcase of paintings and prints but a celebration of a life lived fully and creatively.
As the gallery filled with color and conversation, just across the hall the curtain lifted in the Garfield Theatre for JCompany’s The Little Mermaid Jr. and Mergirl Saves the Wave, performed in repertoire. Grandparents, parents, and children filled the seats, laughter and song echoing through the building.
Meanwhile, others were swimming in the Friedenberg Pool, taking group exercise classes, attending youth basketball, or dropping off children at Dor Hadash’s religious school. In those few hours, I moved from space to space, guests to friends, art to theatre, therapy to laughter, carrying the meaning of each experience into the next.
The rest of the week unfolded the same way: full, layered, alive. By the time my sister spoke those words, “I still haven’t figured out how to be two places at once,” I realized that within the walls of our JCC, I had been doing exactly that: physically in one place, yet emotionally, spiritually, and relationally in many.
As the week came to a close and we welcomed Shabbat together, Amit, one of the Oketz soldiers, spoke about his work in their elite K-9 unit. He explained that they are often solitary, just the soldier and his dog. As a result, they witness things no one else does and carry those memories with them forever: tragic, traumatic, heroic. No matter where they go next, those moments go too.
Rabbi Shulman of Congregation Beth El offered a similar reflection on being in two places at once. To paraphrase, he said, “To be a Jew is to live in two places at once. For more than two years of this horrific war against Hamas, we have been geographically distant from those fighting for Israel, yet our hearts and prayers have been with them every moment. Our feet are here, but our hearts are there.”
As these threads wove together in my mind, I found myself drawn to a teaching from Rabbi David Hartman, may his memory be blessed. His teaching illuminates the concept of having a heart with many rooms. Humans are capable of holding love and grief, compassion and frustration, presence and longing all at the same time. It is both a human gift and a spiritual calling to be in more than one “place” at once.
As Shabbat fades tonight and we look to the week ahead, I pray that we are able to stay grounded in the place where we stand, yet willing to open the doors to the many rooms of our hearts and move with grace into the many places we will go both with our feet and with our souls.
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Betzy Lynch is Chief Executive Officer of the Lawrence Family JCC.