Page 44 - You can't Make This Shit Up!

In Lieu of a Christmas Card
December 14, 2017
“Jingle all the way. No one likes a half-assed Jingler”
There was a time, years ago, when I lamented over our Dafferner family holiday card. I would torture my kids, lining them up, and taking a ridiculous amount of pictures. And...wait for it...this was back in the day when there was a thing called “film” in another thing called a “camera” the had to be... mind- blowing... developed at a picture place!!! So barbaric! Some years, if I felt really ambitus, I would even write a little christmas letter. Those days, much like the picture developing places, are gone.
Here is the reality. Social media really is a year round Christmas card. Anything and everything good, bad or other is posted for all to see. Facebook (fake book) keeps us all up to date on everything. Want to know what we did this year? Friend request me, and save me the time and trouble of making, addressing and sending out cards.
I REALLY REALLY REALLY love Christmas!!! I have really only celebrated Christmas since I married Skee. As a kid it was all Hanukkah, every year. And no matter how cool your menorah is, or how crisp and delicious the latkes, Hanukkah really doesn’t hold a “candle” (punny huh) to Christmas.
What is Hanukkah? The miracle of light and fried foods. A holiday of oil. If you want to have a really easy overview, a “cliff notes” version of Jewish holidays, the basis is this: They tried to kill us. They didn’t succeed in killing us. Lets eat.
Skee is Roman Catholic. In Judaism, the children are whatever religion the mother is. This is really understandable, being as you ALWAYS know who the mother is, and even before the Jerry Spring show, even in biblical times, you didn’t always know who the “baby daddy” was. So lets start there. Easy enough. Even thought “this one” calls herself a Cashew, my three daughters are Jewish.
Wrinkle in that is “the one who shall remain nameless” was baptized a Mormon” when she turned 18. So our family joke is that a Catholic, a Mormon, and 3 Jews walk into a bar, and what do they say? “We are the Dafferners”.
Religion is interesting. I personally do not believe in “organized religion”. I do have faith and believe in G-d. I enjoy tradition. I had a Bat Mitzvah. Both my parents are Jewish. Growing up on long Island, I really only knew Jewish and Italian kids. I didn’t even know about any other religions. Hebrew School was just a given. Tuesday and Thursday nights I would carpool to Temple Beth David, picking up jewish friends who all reeked from whatever their moms force-fed them for dinner. I felt very comfortable in the Temple. It was familiar and inviting. I loved when the temple had the Hanukkah sale. Tables upon tables set up with chocolate gelt, menorahs, dreidles, and candles. The Rabbi had a beard and the Cantor had one hand. We went to Friday night services and then after we had amazing pastries, cookies and Challah. That about sums up my memories of 8 years of Jewish education.