Hanukkah tat
Dec. 3rd, 2010 11:13 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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writing_shadowsHanukkah hadn't been a big festival when Ruth had been a child. It certainly hadn't been the bizarre Jewish Christmas it seemed to be now. Every year, her mother had remembered, just before Hanukkah, that it was coming up. Every year her stepfather had rolled his eyes and says "what is this? Do we live in the shtetl now? Can't we just have a Christmas tree like everyone else?" Every year her mother had shaken her head and said "no Christmas. Oh my God, no Christmas. May heaven save us from that at least!" and that was that.
Some years that turned into her mother digging out the very battered family menorah, including Ruth's very own one which she loved devotedly, but which was one candle holder down following an incident when she was four which she couldn't remember but which her mother told a very funny story about. Other years it was forgotten about. Ruth's birthday, of course, fell on December 14th, which meant that after a while Hanukkah and her birthday just blended together and she grew to associate her battered menorah and the taste of latke with her birthday and with presents and with the taste of cheesecake which her mother always made for her birthday.
She'd never really lost that association.
When Ruth was with Ed, they hadn't really celebrated Hanukkah. She had left her menorah at home when she got on that train pulling out of Berlin on that cold winter's evening and for the next twenty years she hadn't lit the candles at Hanukkah. She'd celebrated her birthday, most years, but Hanukkah had been left behind.
She had lit the candles again for the first time in 1947. She had lit them and she had cried for her family, for her past, for the heritage that she hadn't thought was important until it was too late and she had lit the candles because they seemed to somehow have become an act of defiance, her last rebellion against a world which had turned into an abattoir for her and hers.
She hadn't missed Hanukkah since.
She had cleaned the entire house herself, scurrying around in bare feet and a pair of Dre's ripped up jeans, and snuffling in corners to try and locate a stain which she could smell lingering beneath the beeswax and polish. She had even climbed on chairs in order to dust the arched brick ceilings.
She had bought a new menorah, to symbolize new beginnings. And she wouldn't cook, but she would bottle every scent that mattered; latke and cheesecake, olive oil frying in the pan. She had bought gifts as well - small gifts to send to America for Jack and Jade, and eight tiny trinkets for Dre, not to mention a selection of little gold coins. She knows a woman at shul who has said that giving gentiles gifts on Hanukkah is subverting the Jewish tradition. Ruth, however, was unconvinced that giving gifts at Hanukkah counted as a Jewish tradition and so gave them anyway.
And on 13th December, Ruth would be 110 years old. She suspected that no one would remember her birthday. Maybe Ed, who's familiarity was still an odd piece of string around her heart, no matter what else changed. Still, in a way, celebrating Hanukkah felt like it was enough.
She hadn't felt so human in years.
Some years that turned into her mother digging out the very battered family menorah, including Ruth's very own one which she loved devotedly, but which was one candle holder down following an incident when she was four which she couldn't remember but which her mother told a very funny story about. Other years it was forgotten about. Ruth's birthday, of course, fell on December 14th, which meant that after a while Hanukkah and her birthday just blended together and she grew to associate her battered menorah and the taste of latke with her birthday and with presents and with the taste of cheesecake which her mother always made for her birthday.
She'd never really lost that association.
When Ruth was with Ed, they hadn't really celebrated Hanukkah. She had left her menorah at home when she got on that train pulling out of Berlin on that cold winter's evening and for the next twenty years she hadn't lit the candles at Hanukkah. She'd celebrated her birthday, most years, but Hanukkah had been left behind.
She had lit the candles again for the first time in 1947. She had lit them and she had cried for her family, for her past, for the heritage that she hadn't thought was important until it was too late and she had lit the candles because they seemed to somehow have become an act of defiance, her last rebellion against a world which had turned into an abattoir for her and hers.
She hadn't missed Hanukkah since.
She had cleaned the entire house herself, scurrying around in bare feet and a pair of Dre's ripped up jeans, and snuffling in corners to try and locate a stain which she could smell lingering beneath the beeswax and polish. She had even climbed on chairs in order to dust the arched brick ceilings.
She had bought a new menorah, to symbolize new beginnings. And she wouldn't cook, but she would bottle every scent that mattered; latke and cheesecake, olive oil frying in the pan. She had bought gifts as well - small gifts to send to America for Jack and Jade, and eight tiny trinkets for Dre, not to mention a selection of little gold coins. She knows a woman at shul who has said that giving gentiles gifts on Hanukkah is subverting the Jewish tradition. Ruth, however, was unconvinced that giving gifts at Hanukkah counted as a Jewish tradition and so gave them anyway.
And on 13th December, Ruth would be 110 years old. She suspected that no one would remember her birthday. Maybe Ed, who's familiarity was still an odd piece of string around her heart, no matter what else changed. Still, in a way, celebrating Hanukkah felt like it was enough.
She hadn't felt so human in years.
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Date: 2010-12-03 11:38 am (UTC)no subject
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