New Miracle of Chanukah: Turning Minor Fest Into Gonzo Winter Bash

By LAYNE DREBIN MURPHY

The Jewish press is full of self-help articles about the December dilemma. Right after Halloween these days (O.K., after Thanksgiving at Nordstrom) every facet of commerce and popular culture shifts full-throttle into Christmas. Even at our children's Jewish nursery school, at which many students hail from non-Jewish or intermarried families, the children are seriously stoked. It's always awkward when someone asks one of my little boys what Santa brought him. Jewish educators teach us that our children will get over feeling left out of all this hoopla if we follow the Jewish life cycle and take part in all of the fun and family-centered observances that are part of the Jewish year. They also teach us that Chanukah, while a lovely celebration of freedom and persistence, is a minor festival compared to heavy-hitters such as Passover and the High Holy Days. Rabbis caution us about trying to turn Chanukah into an imitation Christmas just because it falls in December.

Here's a confession that may get our boys' identities turned inside out: Chanukah is a big deal at our house. We don't get all whacked out about presents, although I admit that some are exchanged. Jewish educators always tell us that chocolate coins and dreidels are appropriate gifts for this occasion. My sons didn't just fall off a truck. They know the difference between what counts as a party favor and what counts as a gift. Try telling them their gifts are Chanukah gelt and plastic tops and the battle of the Greeks versus the Maccabees will seem like a Teletubbies tea party.

We are a household with an affinity for homemade extravaganzas including gala birthdays for dogs, champagne-and-caviar Tupperware parties and a baby jamboree at which a dozen newborns nursed simultaneously in a Sukkah. Chanukah offers myriad elements for a great party. Candlelight, drama and the reason that my non-Jewish friends start pestering me for an invite before the equinox: grease. There was a miracle. The oil in the lamp lasted longer than was expected. This is what we celebrate. In my house we also celebrate that Costco sells canola oil in 10-gallon recyclable jugs. Not satisfied with the Jewish-American Chanukah feed of potato pancakes, in my striving for solidarity with my brethren in Jerusalem I have learned to make homemade sufganiyot. Yes, jelly donuts. Our Chanukah feast consists of a deep-fried main course that we top with sour cream and a deep-fried dessert that we top with powdered sugar. While that is not exactly fare from "Diet for a Small Planet," there's always a multicultural clamor to attend. From the eight years total our boys spent at Jewish nursery school and kindergarten we have enough arts-and-crafts project menorahs (more properly called chanukiot) to make for quite the mind-blowing light show.

It's fortunate that with our orgy of frying and blazing beeswax that the batteries from our smoke detectors are doing "temporary" duty in the VCR remote. So, despite the admonitions of Jewish professionals, Chanukah is pretty gonzo with us. You'd think that with all the Chanukah party-hearty my children would be too over-stimulated to feel deprived for lack of celebrating a certain legal holiday that also happens to fall in December. Nope. We have dogged conversations about the existence of Santa and the nature of good and evil, apropos of "naughty or nice."

This year a famous Jew's birthday (that's Jesus, not Steven Spielberg) falls smack in the middle of Chanukah, so we'll at least have something to do on that evening. The biblically enjoined Jewish-Christmas activity is Chinese food and a movie. We've adhered to this prescribed observance for many years, and it has always made me feel like Leopold Bloom roaming around Dublin, virtually the only Jew in a Christian world. It's bleak eating rancid popcorn in a nearly empty theater and knowing that the rest of the world is assembled in homey family groups dishing up the Honey Baked. Last year we had a Jewish Christmas that consisted of takeout and board games with some of our fellow chosen people in observance of the legal holiday. There was nothing Christmasy, warm or fuzzy about it, but we bonded and avoided roaming the empty city like survivors of a nuclear attack.

Our children do grumble about the fact that our house is one of the few in the neighborhood without lights and that we lack a festooned tree surrounded by brightly packaged gifts. Who am I to say that isn't swell stuff? Beautiful stuff? It's just not our stuff. Our refusal to partake of it comes from respect and not disdain. Christmas, despite all of the groovy accoutrement, is hugely steeped in deep religious meaning. For us to co-opt any of the rituals associated with it purely for aesthetic appreciation would be sacrilegious. So maybe we overdo it with Chanukah a smidgen, but this is simply because we're prone to excess, not because we mean to compete with the most significant of the December holidays.

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