Wednesday, December 15, 2004
Light Me Up
At sundown tonight the Festival of Lights will have come to its conclusion for another year. Hanukah, as sophisticated jewologists like me know, celebrates the development of the Code of Hanukarabi, the first ancient king to establish the moral verity,"a gift for a gift, and a re-gift for a re-gift.” This Code ended the primitive concept of gelt-free pleasure, and the world (the clever bits of it anyway) has never looked back.
The motto of the festival (for real, now) is “A great miracle happened there,” referencing the bygone battle between overthrown Hellenized Macedonians and underslung hellfire Maccabees. Yes, Hanukkah is more like Armistice Day than Christmas - it’s basically a celebration of a military victory. This left me feeling rather removed and un-moved, personally and spiritually, from the festival. The miracle mentioned in the slogan happened a long time ago and seemed to me rather weak, as far as miracles go - the restoration of a holy place with an oil lamp that burned for a week longer than it should have lasted. Growing up, this was not the kind of miracle that captured my attention, like those cool passover plagues or Kirk Gibson’s 9th inning home run against the A’s in game 1 of the 1988 world series. The hanukkah miracle just didn’t seem to carry much meaning for me.
My mistake was not seeing the miracles that do happen at Hanukah each year, sometimes right before my unseeing eyes. I always looked back at the old Hasmonean hanukkah miracle, ignoring the fresh wonders that spring up each year at this season like the oilstains I get when I fry potatoes while wearing a nice t-shirt. But this year, somehow, my eyes were opened. Great miracles did happen here - right here, to me and all around me. In celebration and invocation, here are eight of the ones I noticed most clearly:
* Best Latkes ever: 3 potatoes, an onion, a carrot, and a parsnip, shredded; squeezed in cheesecloth to express the liquid, from which starch was then allowed to settle so it could be re-incorporated into the veggies; par-cook the veggies in the microwave and then shape into firm patties and deep-fry. And it turns out, everybody makes latkes - including the Poles and the Irish, at least. What a miracle, that it’s not just Jews and Arby’s that specialize in the tater cake! Who knew?!?
* I searched high and low but could not find a dreydel for the holiday. Maybe I looked in the wrong places but I usually see them all over my ‘hood; this year, there were none at all to be had. Yet when I went to a friends’ little party on night six, their three-year-old girl presented me with one of these rare seasonal toys, demanding that I make it work for her. The miracle was not the tragedy of the missing dreydel, nor the presence of the dreydel in a house where the kids have so many toys that I actually wound up giving them something they already had - it was the joy in that little girl’s eyes as I spun the tiny plastic top. She didn’t care about gambling, winning, rules - she was elated by the physics of the top itself. That’s a fine miracle right there.
* Every night during the holiday, I cleaned out the last night’s leftover wax from my menorah using a specially-designed tool. (Okay it wasn’t designed for that particular purpose, but it was specially designed for its original purpose, and it’s even better at wax-removal than for it’s intended use as a nutmeat pick. That’s right, I’ve got a nutmeat pick, I use it to clean out my old wax, and what’s it to ya?) Yet every night, I’d find enormous quantities of old wax stuck in the menorah, in colors I haven’t burned in years. How did so much old wax hide out in a menorah I clean every single night? The original “miracle” was that the eternal flame in the synagogue burned for eight days with only one day’s worth of consecrated oil. The modern miracle is that, based on the apparent regenerative qualities of melted wax in my menorah, I bet I could have kept it going for an even dozen!
* My new yoga class got me into positions I’ve never been able to attain before, mostly upside-down ones. On the first night of hanukkah we went to this class for the first time and Kel and I both did guided handstands, which were surprisingly easy and satisfying. Last night I went alone and was paired up with a very gentle and supple young woman, who wasn’t able to help me do the handstand again but was very helpful when I did an extended “camel” backbend; her role was to sit in front of me as I knelt, her legs wrapped around mine and her ankles crossed over my shins behind me, and then to hold my elbows as I bent backward toward the floor. I’ll let you figure out the miracle about this one on your own.
* I ate prodigiously during the first part of Hanukah, with plenty of oily latkes, chocolate gelt coins, baked goods, baked bads… I just basically suctioned in all the seasonal food I could reach, at party after party. After five days of festive gorging, I weighed myself - and I’d lost nearly three pounds. Cheered by this result, I curtailed my fat and sugar intake, went back to heart-smart breakfasts and salads for lunch and light suppers.... and three days later I’d gained all the weight back. Diet latkes? Weight-gain formula icewater and whole wheat pita bread? If it’s not a miracle, it sure defies my understanding of my own metabolism. And isn’t that what the holidays are really all about?
* Kelly’s cranberry jelly turns out to be a great topping for vanilla ice cream. At least, I have it on unimpeachable authority that this is true. And assuming as much, that’s pretty damn cool. Miraculous? Depends on how much you like cranberries, but one spoon of this stuff on a bowl of chilled cream will stiffen your pectin but good.
* After about a month of total disutility, my car alarm clicker started working again. Now it sort of trades off with Kel’s; one of them works for a while, and then the other. We need to keep them together now so we can use whichever one is currently functional. Even so, the thing was busted pretty good and now it’s not. IT’S A MIRACLE. Of sorts.
* For eight straight days I had a truly festive and enjoyable holiday. I can’t remember the last time that happened, but it’s inspired me for the new year. And inspiration is probably the most miraculous thing of all. Thanks for sharing the festival with me, and see ya here next year for another OCTOCANDLE MIRACLE WRAPUP!
