Half-Jewish In A Full-Christmas World
Every year it gets me, but this year is particularly real
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It’s a strange time of year for people like me, I think. Let’s start with the old joke about Chanukah: it’s always early or late but never on time. As a child it didn’t matter much either way, because my Jewish Dad would forget about it until about halfway through, like Day 4 or Day 5. He would bring out our one tiny menorah and a box of janky candles that he’d light off the gas stove. We’d make sure the thing was set up a safe distance from our Chanukah bush (a small, squat pine purchased at my school’s Christmas tree sale), which was bristling with ornaments and undergirded by presents. No prayers were spoken over the candles, but we did take a minute to admire the light they gave and acknowledge their Jewishness, which was also ours, sort of.
If this seems, I don’t know, sacrilegious in some way, just know that not one second of it would have been sanctioned by my great-Grandparents, who were born Jewish in Ukraine but became dedicated Marxists, and replaced religious rituals with philosophical rigor long before they immigrated to California. I never met them but their lives are the stuff of family legend: they had strong opinions about the American way of living (ex: roller skates and donuts were considered bourgeois trash, but oranges and chocolate milk were manna), and believed that a good day should end with a civilized glass of Schnapps or Vodka. Their Judaism was strictly cultural. Their community didn't go to Temple or make their children go to Hebrew school, and they spoke English to the world but Yiddish to each other. They identified as Jews in every moment of their lives. Yet they despised Jewish religious doctrine, and saw it as a threat to their survival. My father told me that once when he was getting ready to attend a school friend’s Bar Mitzvah at the local Temple, his Grandfather (always Grandpa, never Zede) took him aside and warned him, sing the prayers and dance the dances but don’t let them in! Dad had never had his own Bar Mitzvah, and like everyone else in the family, didn’t know a word of Hebrew, so being corrupted by the ceremony wasn’t much of a risk.
I am deeply grateful to my Jewish forebears for their sacrifice and hard work. But locating a distinct sense of Judaism inside my personal identity is tricky. Mostly, when I think of my heritage, I think of the American Labor movement, in which my relatives played a part. Two of my great-grandparents were upholsterers, skilled laborers who were among the Jewish diaspora that settled in Los Angeles to work for Hollywood movie studios. They worked on the lot at MGM, making couches and curtains for all kinds of films. They were deeply involved with the early Union Labor movement there, and supposedly held secret Communist meetings in their upholstery workshop right there on the MGM lot (which, if true, is far more badass than anything I will ever do in my life).
I also associate my Jewishness with the particular West Hollywood community that my family belonged to, with its devotion to Canter’s Deli and Hollywood Bowl concerts, and its distinct hatred of nuclear weapons and Ronald Reagan. During the High Holidays, when their neighborhood was all but closed for business, my own Grandparents would go to Chinese or Mexican restaurants with their fellow lapsed Jews and enjoy lively meals. Chanukah was low-key in their home. There was an old silver menorah, a family heirloom, that would get displayed in their living room, but candles were rarely inserted or lit. It was symbolic, a tribute to what Jews had lived through, their tremendous resilience in the face of centuries of suffering, and how they prevailed against forces of oppression that remained active in places all over the world. Wherever there are Jews, there are anti-Semites, my Grandma often told me. We should always be vigilant. She was hyper-mindful of history and cared deeply about the wellbeing of Jews worldwide, and she wanted us to recognize the importance of both.
One of my closest friends actually grew up in the same area, and years into our friendship we discovered that his parents owned the local bookstore that my Grandmother had loved and frequented regularly. This makes my friend feel like family, but although we both have classically Jewish last names, his mother is Jewish and mine is not, which makes him Jewish under Talmudic law, whereas I am a mere halfie, not “authentically Jewish” according to some sects.
There aren’t many examples of half-Jewishness in culture, but there was that song, wasn’t there: Adam Sandler’s Happy Chanuka, in which he gives a shout-out to all kinds of Jewish figures in entertainment, and even mentions halfies Paul Newman and Goldie Hawn put them together what a fine-looking Jew! I once had a lover, a halfie like me, who used to joke Now I am complete! every time we had sex. He meant to be funny, but it always made me cringe from the Jerry MacGuire-ness of it (Adam Sandler again: Tom Cruise isn’t Jewish but I bet his agent is!). I don’t belong to any halfie Facebook groups or Discord channels, and in fact I don’t actually know that many other halfies. I’m not aware that we’re a targeted consumer group, though that might be my typical GenX resistance to advertising.
In high school I was one of very few people of Jewish descent. Most of the school’s holiday cheer was centered around Christmas, which meant participating in all the typical rituals, including an annual pageant that included some kids dressing up as reindeer, who danced around on stage and also pooped tinsel. In my spare time I sang in a professional children’s choir that performed annual Christmas concerts featuring the most difficult carols. Among the many musical skills I learned in that choir, I can harmonize with almost any Christmas song, which makes me a sought-after guest at Christmas parties and neighborhood caroling strolls.
Yet I remained largely ambivalent about both Christmas and Chanukah until I met my husband, whose family is descended from English and Irish people, with some great Christmas traditions that I love taking part in. Hubz also finds my Jewish background compelling, and loves the color and humor of Yiddish so much that every time I teach him a new word he strives to pronounce it in a rigorous accent that does it justice (he’s particularly good at tsuris, mishpucha and the classic oy, which somehow comes out sounding just like my Grandmother!). He also loves a bagel with a schmear just as much as any Jewish guy I’ve ever met, and that includes my own father. When we started dating I began accepting invitations to Chanukah parties and Pesach seders, to share those things with him, and it’s fun to watch him learn about all the history and rich cultural heritage that comes with them.
Making space for both traditions inside my marriage has somehow made them able to coexist peacefully in my heart and mind. In any case, issues of personal identity are complicated and often fraught, and this is not meant to be an in-depth dissection of the subject. But Chanukah is here again, and it arrives during a time when anti-Jewish sentiment appears to be on the rise in America once more, and we must all be vigilant and vocal about it. Accordingly, I would like to add the full strength of my half-Jewish voice to the chorus of people who oppose anti-semitism. I’ll address the antisemites in a way that honors my ancestors: du kenst geyn glakkh in gihnum!
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My kids are halfies too. My lack of Jewish traditions were stem from a different set of circumstances, even though my dad grew up Orthodox. We should tawlk! Oy ❤️