by diane sussman
About 15 years ago, long before Feats of Strength and Festivus, long before we all began wishing each other Happy Christmahanakwanzakah, I found the perfect antidote to the Jewish-Christian culture warp I invariably get sucked into during the holiday season.
For $3.99 each, I bought two pairs of “dreidel-vision” glasses — basically those cheesy, ill-fitting, disposable cardboard glasses with the plastic lenses they used to pass out in movie theaters for first-gen 3-D movies such as “The Creature From the Black Lagoon,” back in the days when IMAX wasn’t a word and movie popcorn had trans fats.
The glasses alter any light source. One pair refracted everything into dreidels, the other into Magen Davids.
With my dreidel-vision glasses, the world was instantly transformed into a totally Jewish land of enchantment. That SUV with the wreath on its grill and battery-powered reindeer antler lights on the roof bearing down on me at the mall? A cheery Jewmobile encased in a sparkling cascade of dreidels. Those caroling children with the candles in their hands and sparkling hats? Yeshiva bochers, Magen Davids blazing from their hearts, walking home from their studies.
The acid test was Christmas Tree Lane in Palo Alto on Christmas Eve. Since the 1940s, neighbors on the five or six blocks of Fulton Street turn the lane into a fairyland of lights and holiday displays. I donned the glasses and — hallelujah! Never had I seen so much Jewish symbolism in one place. “Nice dreidels,” my boyfriend (now husband) said, staring at an elaborate crčche.
After a few years, however, the plastic on the glasses started to crack and break down. More distressing, however, is that the joke started to get old.
In addition, a certain deficiency of the glasses became apparent; namely, that they did nothing to alter the aural input of the season. While I was dreamily staring at a giant rainbow dreidel tree, I would be reminded for the umpteenth time that Alvin wants a Hula-Hoop and Eartha wants “one more thing, a ring.” Until the time comes when someone invents a device that can turn “Silent Night” into “Mazel Tov!” we have a problem.
I needed a new strategy. So four years ago, I got married. On Christmas Eve Day.
In truth, I didn’t plan a Dec. 24 trip to the altar as a way to avoid Jewish seasonal holiday affective disorder. It came about through two characteristics of our style as a couple: busyness and laziness.
Unlike Johnny Cash and June Carter, we didn’t get married in a fever. After nine years together, we had developed well-worn rhythms and grooves — but nothing to rush about. We also had serious scheduling problems. My husband is a musician who works nights and weekends. I work daylight hours on weekdays. Even now, we sometimes don’t connect, other than through Post-it notes, until Saturday morning bagels. Finding a free Saturday night for a movie or symphony date was hard enough. Finding a couple of days for a wedding and honeymoon took seven years.
That’s how we found ourselves at 200 County Center in Redwood City on Dec. 24, exchanging vows before an audience of two: a guitar-player friend who played “Time After Time” and a clerk who was wearing a reindeer pin with a light-up nose and officiating. In 15 minutes, it was over, and we were hustled out to make way for the next couple, both wearing Santa hats and boots with bells.
Fast as it was, though, it worked. For the first time, I had a personal connection to Christmas Eve Day. Even now, there’s a magic to the day that doesn’t rely on cardboard dreidel-vision glasses.
As for all those handmade stockings, angel ornaments and Christmas cookies that arrive like clockwork Dec. 24 — along with the baked hams and wreath-motif pajamas I have to smile and suffer through at my in-laws house on Christmas Day, I have a new attitude. I think of them as anniversary presents. And when they find their way to a soup kitchen or charity the next day, I think of it as my anniversary present to the world.
So if we pass each other this season, let’s be sure to wish each other a very merry Anni-Christmahanakwanzakah.
Diane Sussman is a copyeditor at j.
CopyrightJ, the Jewish news weekly of Northern California