December is a hard time of year for a lot of people. It’s an especially hard time of year for me for two reasons. One is because, many years ago, I broke away from the Christmas traditions of my family of origin when I chose to live a Jewish life.
The other reason is that my mother died seven years ago, after a very brief illness. She died right before Christmas, which, despite the fact that she was Jewish, was her favorite day of the year.
Where do I start the story?
My Jewish mother, who wanted nothing more than to have Christmas, married my non-Jewish father. Bingo! The Jewish orphan girl from the Upper East Side could have a Christmas tree. She wove a wonderful tapestry of Christmas in our house, complete with lights and tinsel and stockings and candles and a glorious tree and Christmas dinner with all our Jewish friends.
There was always a menorah somewhere to mark Chanukah, although it was a minor piece, and we never knew the prayers or sang Chanukah songs. And there was never a crèche. That would just be going too far. Besides, we were atheists. Christmas was about family and friends and food and presents.
As a young adult, I decided that this wasn’t enough for me, and that I needed to find a community where I could infuse more historic and communal meaning into my celebrations. Bingo! I was already Jewish (because my mother was Jewish) and the Jewish community, along with my husband-to-be, welcomed me with open arms. It has become my home. I went back to my roots, as it were, and it has filled me up with what I had been seeking. The menorah that was in the background in my childhood home has a prominent place in my family's celebrations today.
One of the most difficult things I’ve ever done was to tell my mother, when I was first pregnant, that we would no longer be spending Christmas morning wither her, and that her first grandchild would not be celebrating Christmas. This was a hard blow, and it took us several years (and my sister’s fortunate decision to have Christmas-celebrating children of her own) for us to truly reconcile.
My mother ultimately accepted my choices, although she wasn’t thrilled about them. The piece that made this time of year even more prickly was that her birthday was just a few days before Christmas. She coveted attention for that as well, and felt deprived if she didn’t get it. So I learned to lavish her with birthday cheer, although all along there was a meta hum of disappointment because we both knew that on the REALLY important day, I wouldn’t be there.
My December dilemma took a new turn seven years ago when, the day after Thanksgiving, my mother checked herself into the hospital with what she thought was pneumonia. It turned out to be fourth stage lung cancer, and after a three-week rollercoaster ride of doctors, hospitals, decisions and goodbyes, my mother succumbed. It was two days after her 68th birthday; five days before Christmas.
Grief washed over me in waves over many months. We may have had our challenges, but I loved my mother and missed her desperately. Only the oldest of my three children really had a chance to get to know her, and he too, was overcome by sadness. I had to minister to him and to my family while managing my own sorrow, a balancing act pretty much doomed to fail.
Today, many years later, the daily sadness has abated, but I still miss my mother and think about her often. I wish she were around to experience our lives today. I wish she had witnessed the election of our country’s first African American President, and that we could share the political ups and downs of this time. I wish she had lived long enough to get a cell phone, to learn how to text with her grandchildren. I wish she could be with us at our daughter’s bat mitzvah this spring.
But the time I most miss her is right now – during this season of lights and tinsel and festivities and kindness. Yes, she made a horrifying chcocolate Yule Log for her annual Christmas party, and yes, she wore silly holiday dresses and yes, we had a difficult journey around my decision to eschew Christmas and embrace a Jewish life.
But in the end, we loved each other. This is what I remember most at this darkest moment in the year, and what I remember when I add yet another light, next to our Chanukah candles, to splinter the darkness – a special yahrzeit candle that burns for 24 hours in her memory.
I remember the love that lit us up and brought us together, no matter what storms passed our way.
Happy holidays to all.
Photo by srqpix via Flickr
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