It was the first night of my daughter Tessa’s first Hanukkah. My husband, Jason, had to work that night, so I said the blessings, lit the candles, and took a few pictures of Tessa with the menorah to email to the grandparents.
Bedtime came and went. Tessa was asleep in the next room, and the candles were slowly melting down. Next thing I knew, I smelled something burning. The Shamash candle had tipped over. I looked at the cross-stitched “Happy Hanukkah” pillow propped near the menorah. (Yes, I realize this was not the best place for it, and no, I don’t usually have a cross-stitched anything in my home. But it was a gift. A gift that, at the moment, was on fire.) I took a deep breath and blew on the pillow. The flames went out. We were safe, but the apartment reeked of charred polyester.
There it was—the lone casualty. The blue and white, apparently quite flammable pillow was now quite destroyed, sporting a large swath of black across the middle.
It now read Ha— H——ah.
And that is how the Lutheran wife burned her Jewish husband’s “Happy Hanukkah” pillow on their daughter’s (the Jewtheran’s) first Hanukkah. I should have known something like this would happen. The thing is, we aren’t good at holidays. We are, dare I say it, a tad cursed. Fourth of July three years ago, Jason got poison ivy. Christmas last year, Tessa and I were delayed at the airport for ten hours. Valentine’s Day two years ago, we all got the stomach flu. I could go on.
Being the family member in charge of All Things Decorative as well as the designated Family Event Coordinator, I thought I was going about this the wrong way. Maybe what we needed was a special tradition to break this holiday curse. So I sat down at the desk, wine in hand, and Googled “making the best holiday tradition ever.”
You would be surprised to see how many ideas there were. A lot of them were crafty. Many were too holiday-specific. One of my first hits: “Make a foaming chocolate milk bath sachet!” My favorite? “A squash for all seasons—goods from the garden turned gourd-eous holiday decorations!”
I can sew a not-so-perfect hem. I can handle a glue gun. I can work the oven (though I’ve been known to plead ignorance on that last one in favor of ordering Chirpin’ Chicken). But I know Tessa will just want to drink her bath water if it is chocolate-y (let alone foaming) and don’t even get me started on gourds and puns. After hours of surfing, I was no closer to finding our perfect tradition than having the 2/3 train actually run express on the weekends.
But then I thought about all of the times our holiday curse has exerted its influence in our lives. When we were snowed in at the airport, it was annoying, but Tessa and I played and told stories, just the two of us. When we all had the stomach flu, we didn’t feel great, but we vegged in front of the TV and watched movie after movie, which began a tradition of Sunday morning movie time. Okay, so the poison ivy didn’t do much but make Jason miserable, but you get my point.
I realized our holiday curse forces us to stop. We stop preparing, wrapping and stressing. Our little disasters force us to concentrate on what is important about the holidays—being together. Our holiday curse is our special holiday tradition.
We still have that charred, cross-stitched pillow. It is propped at the top of the bookshelf, a daily reminder of our special tradition, so we don’t have to wait for a holiday to remember what is important.
And, in case you were wondering, we now have an electric menorah.
