As a kid I wanted to celebrate Christmas. Felt guilty as hell about it, but I did. Those beautifully decorated trees, the light displays on the homes in town and general secular festivity had me yearning annually for a Christmas tree to decorate, the Christmas Eves and Mornings of lore and, of course, the great treasure trove of presents under the tree. Now how cool was that – presents waiting for you under that magnificently decorated, warm, glowing Christmas tree.
Being Jewish, my brothers and I grew up with Chanukah. Somehow, 8 days of lighting the menorah didn’t measure up to what our Christian friends did for Christmas. For those of you who don’t know, Chanukah candles last maybe 30-45 minutes before burning out. Once the candles go out, there’s no evidence of the holiday season in which the rest of the world was already immersed. Another Chanukah fact for those who have always celebrated Christmas: Few kids get presents each of the 8 nights. Most get them the first and maybe second, night. Trust me, Christian friends – in general, we Christmas-envious Jews didn’t come close to making out on Chanukah as well as you did on Christmas.
[I acknowledge that this likely doesn’t apply to the “kids want / parents buy” generations of following us baby boomers. More importantly and conversely it never applies to those too poor for their kids to “make out” on any holiday.]
Hmm… maybe that’s why my partners in life have been Catholic. From the first Christmas with my first partner gifts were exchanged on Christmas (Christmas Eve to be exact), not Chanukah. They were also accustomed to having a Christmas tree. Being raised with the idea that having a Christmas tree in my home was heresy, it took my first partner 5 years to erode that erroneous indoctrination. Once he succeeded, though, 27 years of Christmas envy was released like a deluge as we bought, carried home and decorated our first tree in our
Don’t get me wrong here. I’m as proud of being Jewish as I am of Jewish culture, history and tradition. That said, I think that over time the Jewish culture has taken what was likely a minor Jewish holiday and tried to make it competitive with Christmas. To those still pushing that futile concept to Jewish kids I paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen in saying, “I’ve seen Christmas and Chanukah is no Christmas.”
But, you know – Chanukah has some cool songs, not the least of which is Adam Sandler’s “Chanukah” – embedded below from youtube.
Finally, today is December 23rd. Happy Birthday to Mike, my friend of 52 years. To Frank Costanza and his followers around the world, “HAPPY FESTIVUS!”
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