Ah, Christmas memories. Crouched in the back of a CPD squad car cruising through Englewood. Diners crowded into a busy River North Thai restaurant. The great rose window of the Rose of Sharon Community Baptist Church, backlit by flame.
Not your average Christmas memories. Then again, I am not your average Christmas celebrant. In fact, I've never observed the holiday in my life. Never woke up and scampered downstairs to see what Santa left me. Never lived in a house with a tree. Not once. I'm a Jew. We don't do Christmas.
Okay, not generally. Some Jews do. They figure, the holiday is secular enough, why not join the party? Why miss out on fun, even if it's somebody else's fun? And I don't judge them.
Okay, maybe I judge them a little. Cookies and carols are one thing. But a tree? Really? A "Hanukkah bush"? It's like wearing a medal for a battle you didn't fight in.
What I have done, quite religiously, is work on Christmas. This year, needing to blow off a week of vacation or else lose it — and never losing vacation is close to holy writ for me — I deliberately took off the week of the 15th, so as to be back now, to lighten the load for my colleagues who have presents to wrap and mistle to toe and whatever else it is must be done to commemorate Jesus's birth.
When I started at the Sun-Times, I'd work the night shift at Christmas, 6 p.m. to 2 a.m., grumbling mightily, trying to hide the fact that being in the newsroom on Christmas was great. You got paid double-time. There were platters of cookies and cold cuts. Not many people around. Often a bottle tucked somewhere. I remember sitting at the slot — the U-shaped central news desk — with ... thinking hard ... Jim Merriner, maybe? Silently sipping bourbon in white styrofoam coffee cups. Listening to the police scanner crackle at midnight.
Being me, I tried to take advantage of the opportunity, wondering: who else works Christmas? I spent Christmas eve, 1986, riding around Englewood in the back of a police cruiser with a pair of rookies. Writing the story gave me a lot of respect for police officers — I was scared, running up the stairway of a pitch black six-flat, and I was with two cops.
Another Christmas I visited Asian restaurants and interviewed Jews — and Muslims — happily chowing down. One said that eating Chinese food on Christmas is a Jewish tradition. Prompting a rabbi to phone me a couple days later to express outrage that I had somehow maligned Jewish traditions. I said something along the lines of "Rabbi, don't you see that you complaining is a worse insult to Judaism than the thing you're complaining about?" Leading to further complaints, meetings and apologies, teaching me a valuable lesson: save candor for people you respect.
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This lovely and touching piece kept bringing up points that triggered potential comments. I will restrict it to one. From some years ago, I remember an NPR segment that highlighted the popularity of Christmas in Tokyo despite there being very few Christians among the populace. But what isn't there to like about the bright colors, music, and exchange of gifts? And, Neal, have a wonderful New Years, an event recognized by everyone.
ReplyDeleteIn most of my working life, I always took the Christmas shift. Day or Night depending on the employer. You're right - double pay or time on the books. A nice present.
ReplyDeleteEnjoy life indeed. Beautiful column
ReplyDeleteSo many good words in one place!! Thank you!
ReplyDeleteI have a Muslim friend who celebrates Christmas, but she's married to a Catholic and there are children, so ....
ReplyDeleteI was raised Lutheran - though that's in the rear view mirror. The hubbub over Xmas no longer works for me. A consumer frenzy over the birth of a guy with fantasist biographers 2000 years ago? Unseemly. It comes around so often. If we must celebrate, how about every four years, like the Olympics? No tree this year - maybe in 3 years.
ReplyDeleteThe last paragraph of this story is simply beautiful.
ReplyDeleteIt reminds me of my grandfathers last week on this earth. It made my anger at the Rabbi melt away like the stain glass.
Be kind to your neighbors. Hold your loves tight. Enjoy the holidays. Abolish ICE. Fight fascism.
"Wesołych Świąt Bożego Narodzenia," Pan Steinberg.
ReplyDeleteHow about a translation?
DeleteIt means: "Merry Christmas, Mr. Steinberg." And to you, Anonymous, I say: "Szczęśliwego Nowego Roku." Take a wild guess.
DeleteI was raised (now that I think of it) in a pretty low-key tolerant Protestant household. Suburban WASP'y. In the decades since I have learned that all the faiths have something to teach us and to admire. I do think the solstice, and the re-tipping of the Earth has meaning on a biological level. I appreciate the lighting of lights in a way to fight against the long hours of night-time. It's all good.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I have no idea what they do in the Southern Hemisphere. They're on their own!
My wife, now a retired operating room nurse, always worked Christmas, sometimes a double shift, to give her gentile colleagues a chance to be home with their families. It was usually fairly quiet—no one schedules discretionary surgery for Christmas—but emergencies knew no holidays.
ReplyDeleteThanks to your wife Rick from the collective Goyium.
DeleteA gem of an essay! Thanks!
ReplyDeleteWhen I was single I volunteered to work nights on Christmas Eve (11 PM- 7 AM on Christmas Day) so coworkers with children could be home on Christmas AM. For the most part, the shifts were quiet. The most memorable year was in 1983 when temperatures dropped to some ridiculously low temperature. My coworkers and I agreed to take on additional duties so that one kind coworker was freed up to do "car maintenance". This involved moving all our cars close together in the lot, and starting them every hour so we could get out of work at 7:30 AM on Christmas morning.
ReplyDeleteToday's EGD really resonates with me, Mister S, as many of my fellow tribesmen probably label me a Jew in name only...a non-practicing JINO. My live-in girlfriend after college was Swedish. We had a tree. My first wife was Norwegian. We had a tree. My present wife of 33 years is German. Biggest tree of all, and the most beautiful. Do I like it? Yes, I do.
ReplyDeleteHave never had any "Hanukkah bushes"...it's always been a f'king CHRISTMAS TREE. Am neither ashamed nor apologetic. Marry a shiksa...do what the shiksas do. But I've lit the same menorah since I was eleven. Only Jewish thing I really do anymore...go figure. My Nordic partners seem to have enjoyed it.
The holiday has become less religious than secular and multi-cultural, and an economic engine that probably stuns overseas visitors into numbness. A party to which I was not invited as a young person. Hated it. Have since married into two gentile families, so why not join the party? Why miss out on fun, even if it's goyische fun? They brought Christmas into my world, so why fight it anymore? Don't exactly embrace it--but learned to tolerate and accept it for what it is...a good way to fight off December's gloom and darkness.
My cup of coffee at the Sun-Times was brief, but it included two Decembers...'76 and '77. It was just as you described it, Mister S. Worked the overnights, between midnight and dawn. Made the best of it. Being in the wire room on both Christmas AND New Year's Eve was lucrative...triple time, if I remember correctly. There was food, wine, and weed, and almost all of the people working were either high or tipsy.
Listened to the police scanner crackle after midnight in '76 A fire on Milwaukee Ave. A dozen Hispanic immigrants leaping to their deaths. The newsroom sobered up in a hurry. That was the year the city started teaching first responders Spanish, and to yell "No brinque!" instead of "Don't jump!" Those classes continue today, and they are still needed...now more than ever. And fire and Christmas are still partners.
Once again, Mister S, thanks for the memories. Have a joyous holiday season.
Double B's last comment (be kind to your neighbors, etc.) says it all
ReplyDeleteI like the holiday from a standpoint of pagan ritual. Bringing a tree in the house covering it with lights in the darkest days of the year.
ReplyDeleteI'm A gift giver but don't participate in the consumer madness.
Do all my shopping at Komodo on Chicago avenue near Western. Sherry is the best I buy things that I want for myself and then I give them to others
Got a tree a couple days ago it'll come down the day after New years. When the boys were little I would go out and we'd cut one.
Time with family a good meal some music play some games.
There's a lot I don't like with the madness that surrounds Christmas.
Might go to midnight mass the rituals I like the rituals
Saw midnight mass on TV at 15, in '62, and really wanted to go.
DeleteMy Catholic buddy and his family said "Cool!" Old Yeller said "No way..."
Finally went at 63, to a gorgeous inner-city 1890s Polish church.
Blew me away. Mostly in Latin and Polish. Not a lot of English.
When the little old guy next to me shook my hand, I almost cried.
White-haired, small, alone. With the grip of a steelworker. Neighborhood guy.
Realized what Christmas is all about.
It's a big elaborate birthday party.
glad you visited there, Grizz
DeleteChristmas has become a secular holiday; and that's not bad-the part everybody can celebrate.
ReplyDeleteWrite columns like this instead of your insults to our glorious leader. Those columns are fake and gay.
ReplyDeletepaul should have the reindeer sleigh run him over ;)
DeleteGlorious leader??? What planet is Paul living on?
ReplyDelete