A bomb shelter during wartime

can be a microcosm of the absurdity of life

It’s 3 a.m. Sirens wail, and the Israel Home Front app is shrieking. We live on the sixth floor of an apartment building and taking the elevator is ill-advised. Bleary-eyed neighbors clog the stairwell. It’s narrow, dim, chaotic. People descend at different speeds. Some are calm. Others, not so much.

Suddenly, a commotion! A woman — late 70s, visiting from France — tumbles headfirst down the stairs in a darkened section. She doesn’t speak Hebrew or English. Her daughter, an immigrant to Israel, cries out. People try to help. Hell, I try to help. Mainly there are proffered hands. The woman is finally reorganized, sitting dazed on the steps, and the stairwell is blocked.