What is Real Life?

Someone sent me a generic forward recently showing kids in Africa, (I assume) living is sub-standard living conditions. The caption on the e-mail said, "Thankful" or something like that. Then the persoanl message was, "This is real life sweetie!" Well truly for these kids, it is their real life and for the rest of us it would be a hellish nightmare. The idea of course is to remind us how lucky we are to live in a first world country and have all the luxuries that 3/4 of the world does not have. Well I can say that although there are days I forget, I know that most of the time I am truly grateful for what I have. I realize that even on the small salary my husband makes we have more than many people in this world and one does not need to go to a third world country to find children living in abject poverty, barely surviving. I know people who survived childhood by sleeping in abandoned tunnels in Israel, I know people who survived childhood by sleeping cars in America and I grew up with people who survived childhood despite their parents drug abuse.
However, I don't think things have to be a worst case scenario to be real. The life that each one of us leads is very real to us and it is not for another person to say whether or not that life is real. I have friends that recently moved back to Israel after being gone for six years. They have gotten many comments such as, "oh you are Israeli, it is so easy for you." Or "Everyone has stress, you just have to deal." It has made their adjustment that much more difficult. For one this is a country that reinvents itself every 7 years and for another, things simply change in that much time. I feel it is unfair to belittle someone's stress simply because it is not seen as crucial as say the child with no bed in Africa.
Whether a person's life seems real to one person is irrelevant because to the person living it, it is very real. But more importantly, shouldn't we be grateful for the opportunity we have, that we can evaluate ourselves and figure out how to improve ourselves and our lives. I think the bigger loss would be to say, "well I am doing better than some kid in Africa, guess I don't have to work to achieve anything else." What a waste of the opportunities and resources we have if we do not take advantage of them. Because my children have food and a warm place to sleep every night, it means I have more time to figure out how to be a better parent and how to give them a better education. If I did not evaluate these things and stopped at the fact that they are well fed and clothed, I would be doing them a disservice.
As for me, what is "Real Life?" "Real Life" is when I look at my 3 kids and see them playing together even though I have a 3 year old and 6mo. old twins. "Real Life," is when I realize I am married to someone who believes with all his heart that he is doing the right thing for his family. And when I realize that my children will grow up bi-lingual with out giving it another thought. If anyone has seen the movie, "The Family Man" with Nicholas Cage, he goes from being a single corporate exec. to a father with 2 kids living in the New Jersey burbs overnight. This happens of course through Christmas Magic to teach him a lesson. But I can really relate. As sometimes, I stop what I am doing look at my family when I see them all crowded into our bed on a Satuday morning and wonder, "when did this happen!?" and I think this is "Real Life" for me.
This winter I hope to push my self to learn better hebrew, or else I am not taking advantage of the oppportunity I have living in a foreign country. I hope to push my self to learn more Torah or I am wasting my time living in the birth place of Judaism. I want to push my self to learn more and to be more so that my children will learn by example and do the same. So that we do not waste the opportunities that our "Real Life" has given us.

Shavua Tov,
Have a great week!