The Jewish Holidays and I

My brother Robert and I grew up in a non-religious Jewish home. The only holidays we practiced were Passover and Jewish Christmas. On Jewish Christmas which coincidentally falls on the Christian Christmas we received toys that were placed under our Hanukah Bush. The Hanukah bush standing a stately 2 feet tall was decorated with blue and white lights and silver tinsel. It was quite beautiful when it was lit and probably would have looked great next to a major award leg lamp if we only had won one.

We eagerly awaited the morning of Jewish Christmas and had difficulty falling asleep the night prior. We left potato pancakes and Manishewitz grape wine on the table for Hanukah Harry to have a nosh when he alit on our roof top in his Cadillac pulled by eight horses, Moishe, Schmulie, David, Eli, Irving, Tevye, Hershel and Pedro.

My brother and I would paste black construction paper pais to our temples with Elmers glue-all so that Hanukah Harry, whom I will refer to as HH, would know that we are good Jewish Children. Elmer's glue-all is made from dairy products and is homogenized so that when you eat it you won't suffer from indigestion.  This is an excellent glue to use when you tend to eat things in your sleep.

We would eventually fall asleep and not see HH when he placed the gifts under the bush but to this day I would swear that I had detected the aroma of shmaltz (rendered chicken fat) and chopped liver in my sleep. We have heard stories of HH leaving somewhat practical gifts such as sweaters, socks and gloves but in my home we never received these kind of gifts. We received GI Joe, Silly Putty, Slinky, etch-a-sketch. Now these were meaningful gifts. We would have our GI Joes set up a perimeter replete with a slinky barrier fence to protect us as we slept and safeguard our Etch-a-sketch and other treasures.

After I grew up and became the head of my household (my wife said I could say that) we instituted a more traditional Jewish Christmas and began referring to it as Hanukah.  Instead of placing the gifts under a bush we placed them in a corner of the living room and opened at least one gift every one of the eight nights. We would mix in real gifts with some fun fake gifts. Such as a can of soup or a roll of toilet paper. Imagine the laughs that this caused. Actually only Ilana and I laughed. The kids cried. Oh, what the hell it was fun to look at their bright, cute wide eyes as they opened a beautifully wrapped box and found only a jar of bacon bits.

Have you ever noticed that during the holiday season the radios play hundreds of great songs regarding Christmas and only four about Hanukah. And three of the four were written by Adam Sandler. My kids asked why Santa Claus hated Jews.

Kids:  

Why does Santa hate Jewish people?

Us:      

We would ask why do you believe he hates Jews?  (Jews always answer  questions with a question).

Kids:  

Because he doesn't leave gifts an Christmas Day for us.

Us:      

You see, Hanukah Harry, has the rights to leaving gifts to Jewish children and  if  Santa leaves gifts he will sue him. HH has a Jewish lawyer and you know that the best lawyers are Jewish.

My daughter was one of the few Jewish kids in her class and believed in Santa Clause until she was eight. She was the last one to have this belief dashed upon the rocks. Now she is twenty four and still believes in Hanukah Harry. I don't know how we are going to break it to her. She believes that Hanukah Harry resides in a card size piece of plastic and gives gifts all year round. I hide the bills and pay them when they come in so she doesn't find out that HH doesn't exist. I know. I spoil her.

 

The other Jewish Holiday we observed and still do is Passover. This Holiday commemorates the Hebrew people fleeing Egypt and getting indigestion. My father came from an orthodox family but when his parents passed away within a short time of each other he began to question religion and God and slowly drifted away from orthodox observance. His family, however, remained religious and practiced a traditional Passover meal, the Seder, which was read entirely in Hebrew and lasted about two hours before you could begin to eat.

As we did not come from a religious upbringing neither my brother or I understood or even read Hebrew so you could imagine that the ceremony felt more like a lifetime rather than two hours.  On the first night we went to Uncle Abe and Tanta Rose's home in Fort Hamilton, Brooklyn. Tanta Rose was my Father's paternal aunt I don't remember if she spoke English. The Seder was very formal and lengthy. On the second night we went to my Aunt Rose and Uncle Bernie's home in Neponsit, Rockaway, Queens. Uncle Bernie was my dad's maternal uncle. Their home was less religious and more comfy. The Seder was somewhat shorter and she served a mean meatloaf stuffed with potatoes.

When we were first married we would celebrate Passover at my sister-in-law Rena's home in Bayside, Queens.  Her son, Boaz, was attending a Yeshiva and had aspirations of becoming a Rabbi. I thought that my days of attending lengthy Seders was over. I was wrong.

 

Boaz, who incidentally is now a prominent Rabbi, Educator and Community Developer in Israel, whom we are immensely proud of, made it his mission to ensure that we understood the ceremony. He would read the passages in Hebrew and then for our benefit would re-read it in English. Then he would provide a commentary of the readings followed by a question and answer period. After two hours of this his brothers would have no more and would do everything under the sun to disrupt his lessons and get to the eating part. To sum up Boaz's brothers, my nephews Joe, Ron and Tamir, think of the Marx Brothers on speed and steroids and you can imagine what ensued.

My wife and I now celebrate Passover in our home and have my brother's family and our nephews and nieces over. We have fine-tuned the Seder to last about forty minutes and it is read entirely in English, as God intended. We even use finger puppets to portray the ten plagues.

So, There you have it. What does Judaism mean to me? Jewish Christmas, Hanukah, eight crazy days and nights of latkes, fried donuts, brisket and gifts. Passover, eight crazy days and nights of indigestion from eating matzo and it's many incarnations including matzo balls, matzo brie and matzo pizza. And prunes, plenty of prunes.