My relationship with Debbie my good friend and partner to all, started in my youth and lasted in a mental relationship for 38 years until the murder. When I found out about the murder, my initial reaction was to run to the phone to talk to Debbie, share it and thereby digest the deal.
I met Debbie when my family moved to Washington. I was in the seventh grade and Debbie, who was a tall, beautiful, lively and generous girl, received me, the new girl, with warmth and love.
The friendship between us developed naturally, somehow without noticing we became friends in heart and soul. Even then, her character traits stood out as a quiet, truth-seeking leader. Debbie was also very creative and an excellent student, but most of all she showed the characteristic of caring for others and her participation in the joy of everyone, or to differentiate in the trouble of everyone.
We moved together from childhood to girls and enjoyed every moment. Our friendships grew stronger, but for three not-so-easy years the ocean separated us, as my family moved to the country and Debbie stayed in Washington.
We corresponded frequently and shared our very different experiences, with Debbie's great desire to come to Israel echoing in the background of the letters. How much she feared not being accepted to college, since her Torah background was not strong enough, and how much she was happy to come and be here.
It later became clear that in our friendships we were, apparently, the messengers of Gd's, who led Debbie to her true destination, to meet my brother Eli and influence his life, so that he too could influence her life and together build a house full of light and Torah.
I am reminded of a few points that describe Debbie's lush and amazing personality:
At the Purim meal we were staying at in the house of Eli and Debbie, my daughter Ashira who was seven years old, she asked Debbie to pour her a drink. Debbie started pouring and Ashira stopped her in the middle and explained that she had been taught that it was not polite to finish drinking in a bottle. Debbie laughed and said, "You're right, when you take it for yourself it's really not nice to finish everything on your own, but I pour you and when you give to others you have to give to the end."
In another case, when Debbie learned that one of her family had an eye disease and had severe vision problems. Aside from the verbal emotional identification, Debbie was walking around her house that day with a handkerchief covering her eyes. She had to feel how he felt. She wanted to understand his suffering in order to share his grief in the most genuine way.
There were times when Debbie was so carried away by the problems of friendships that she forgot about everything else. One night, many years ago, we received a phone call in Hall Mali at about one o'clock in the morning, "Debbie with you?" You do not know where she is? 'Eli said that Debbie had left three hours earlier to borrow a friend and had not returned. Eli was on the verge of hysteria out of concern and was about to call the police. He could not go out looking for her because the children were small.
My husband got dressed and set off. In those days we had no vehicles and my husband searched for Debbie all the way to their house. When he got to their house, he went out to look for me. At some point Debbie returned home and was surprised to find her brother-in-law doing a babysitter on her children.
After her brother-in-law and her husband finished "proving" her (to say the least), they asked where she had gone? Debbie explained that she thought Eli was asleep and therefore would not take care of her, and on the other hand, the company she accompanied had problems that bothered her greatly and Debbie could not leave her without giving her a chance to break free from her grief.
But most of all Debbie was for me the nurse I never had. There was nothing that we did not share with each other, we shared in everything, from everyday words to the things that really matter.
We both had some difficult experiences with having children. Many years ago, when I had a son, Debbie came to visit me at the hospital. The baby was born premature and Debbie first approached the preterm to see him. She asked to see our son and understood from the nurses' conversation that the child was very ill. She was very surprised and horrified.
Debbie came to me and asked me in imaginary calm if everything was fine with the boy. I told her yes, as far as I know, but she knew the truth. When she went out at the end of the visit, her whole body was covered in rash from grief and excitement.
That's how Debbie was for me. A stake in my life. Always there for me as I tried to be for her.
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