In war, there is no guidebook on how to spend your time during its distorted days, or how to survive when you’re only living a semi-life. There are no exercises or activities that keep your mind from going crazy.

For me, the war passed by, and I tried to plan days that would keep me awake and alive until I was lucky enough to see a truce.

At first, it was like waiting for your turn at the dentist. In the half hour you wait, you think: When will this finally be over? How long will it be before the doctor extracts my tooth? How much pain will it require? The thoughts go on and on until they’re interrupted by your name being called, then it’s your turn.

This is what happened to me after my displacement from Gaza to Deir Al-Balah. I was thinking all the time about when it would be over and when I could return home, to my university, my friends, my books, my colors, my cotton, my apricots.

I was paralyzed with inaction, until I eventually realized that the wait wouldn’t be a brief few hours or days, but months. I picked up one of the wooden sticks we use to prepare tea on the charcoal fire and, using it as a drawing tool, began to empty my sadness and anger on the wall. I drew my house, and turned it into a tent; I drew a happy face made sad. I didn’t have my usual paints and pens, so I continued resorting to charcoal. Art was my cure.

I was preparing for an eventual truce, which I’d believed in even through all the months of despair and paralysis. I started drawing comics: With their simplicity, I could be free in my lines and put the truth of what we’re living in the hands of the world.

These comics began with my friend’s idea to invent the character of Farah, a 12-year-old girl. He gave her this name because ‘Farah’ means joy and happiness. He encouraged me to tell the story of her displacement as she struggles to send paper-plane messages, hoping someone will find them behind the wall surrounding the Gaza Strip.

As I wrote, even as I was displaced myself, my faith that a truce would happen increased each day. I put all my hope into Farah until I finished drawing her story.

Then the news of the ceasefire agreement was circulated as an attempt to reach a solution. Throughout these days, I was swinging between the peaks of pessimism and optimism until the scale of optimism tipped and hope became a reality with Trump’s announcement of the deal being signed.

At that time, my belief that happiness would never reach me completely dissipated. This news made me so happy that I danced. Voices rose and rose in the streets, cheering. We are people who know very well how to be happy. Finally, the waterfalls of blood will stop. I have survived. I have really survived.

I will return to Gaza, the city that I love, to my home, to my room, and everything in it. Just thinking about that makes me feel warm, even though I am in a tent. We will restore life to Gaza in its true colors and shake off the ashes and dust.

Editor’s note: Read To the World: A Comic from Gaza, written by Jehad Abu Dayya and illustrated by Esraa Albanna, on Instagram.