It's a Christmas tradition. I know because I made it up.

[miss_yt]

For your amusement, the latest, greatest, most recently revised version of my own orignal piece of short fiction, Without Santa: A Jewish Christmas Story.

Without Santa : A Jewish Christmas Story

by Hannah Wald

When I was little I loved Christmas, like most American girls my age. But I could only get it secondhand—I was Jewish, so my family didn't celebrate Christmas.

This caused problems.

Every holiday season throughout pre-school and kindergarten brought me a mix of wonder, envy and disappointment. I could not sing the cheerful Christmas carols without feeling guilty, nor could I have bright Christmas decorations in or on my house. Worst of all, I couldn't get presents from Santa Claus, who gave better gifts on one Christmas Eve than my parents gave in all eight nights of Hanukah. The winter holiday with which I had to content myself had none of the splendor or magic of Christmas.

When I was five years old, my sense of winter holiday inadequacy was brought to a terrible pitch when I joined my mother (not by choice) on a mall shopping trip in mid-December. I remember that evening more clearly than I remember yesterday. There were hordes of holiday shoppers stampeding in all directions, courting disaster with their unwieldy loads of purchases. The din they produced did not quite drown out the peppy Christmas music playing over the speakers. I was too busy ogling the bright decorations that decked the wide, shop-lined halls to be irritated by the crowd or the noise.

Not so my mother, who jerked my hand to get my attention. "Becky, you're dawdling again," she scolded me, shouting to be heard over the roar of the crowd. The hubbub was making her tetchy, but then again everything made Mom tetchy. She resumed her brisk walk, forcing me into a trot so I could keep up with her as she darted into a Sharper Image store. I stuck my tongue out at her while she wasn't looking.

The store was almost as packed as the corridor outside, so Mom wouldn't let me wander around while she made her purchases. I didn't know why she needed me along to shop for gifts for her friends - friends who were complete strangers as far as I was concerned. I had come to the conclusion that she'd dragged me along as punishment for pushing my little brother down the stairs the day before. Any shopping trip with my mother was torture for me, as she well knew. And since this particular trip was saturated in the Christmas-ness that I coveted, it was a bad thing made infinitely worse.

After finishing at the Sharper Image, Mom entered the fray again, dragging me in her wake. We hung a left into one of the main arteries of the mall. At the end I could see the massive entrance to a Bloomingdale's (I recognized the illuminated letters as more of a picture than a word). Mom was headed straight for it. I groaned and rolled my eyes. If my luck was really bad and my mom was really determined, she'd take me to the kids' section to try on clothes. Ugh.

Then something new caught my eye. Between us and the Bloomingdale's was a great, glass-domed rotunda where our corridor was bisected by another one of the same size. My diminutive stature prevented me from making out more than the tops of a cluster of tall, stately pine trees decorated with baubles and ribbons, as well as a green roof sprinkled with white that sported what looked like a golden angel weathercock. I tried jumping up and down a few times to get a better look, but after two hops my mother told me to cut it out.

As we drew closer, I caught a glimpse of red velvet ropes suspended from fancy brass posts. These demarcated a zigzagging path in which people were lined up. Some of these people were adults, but as many or more were kids my own age, or younger. I was starting to get an idea of what the whole thing—the trees, the house, and the line—was about.

My hypothesis was confirmed when Mom and I passed right by it: it was a Christmas House! The pine trees I had seen earlier were artistically arranged around what looked like a gingerbread cottage about the size of a one-car garage. House and trees were enclosed in a circle of low white picket fence. Most of the floor inside was covered with tinsel-laden cotton "snow." There were two paths in the circle, one leading from the velvet-roped line to the house's door, the other going around the house to a rear gate. To my five-year-old's eyes, this cheap and temporary construction looked nothing less than marvelous.

But the feature that really captured my attention was sitting on the wide step in front of the house. For there, seated in a great red and-green throne and attended by a handful of viridian-clad elves, was Santa Claus. He was listening attentively to a pair of twin boys who sat in his lap. I was young and naïve enough to think that I was looking at the Santa Claus—nobody had ever set me straight on that matter.

My eyes were drawn to him by some strange magnetic force, and I ogled in his direction until Mom took me far enough that the trees and the house blocked my view. I heard him emit a hearty "Ho ho ho! Meeeeeerry Christmas!" just as we passed out of sight.

The magnificent decorations, the Christmas music, my boredom and a severe case of cultural frustration had already combined into a volatile mix in my childish mind. Seeing Santa and hearing his "ho ho ho" set off an explosion of strange and urgent need. I turned to face my mother. "Mom?" I asked, shouting above the ambient noise. "Can I sit on Santa's lap?"

"Not right now, sweetie," she replied absentmindedly. My heart sank—when she said "not right now" like that, it was Mom-code for "no." I looked back at the Christmas House, which was already being swallowed up by the crowds, as we entered Bloomingdale's.

I sighed and suffered as my mother browsed through the perfume section, feeling as if I'd been done a great injustice. My eyes wandered to the store entrance, and lit on the tops of the pine trees surrounding the Christmas house. I thought about Santa and his hearty laugh. Santa, my chance to have the Christmas I desperately wanted, so close and yet so far...

So if Mom wasn't going to let me visit Santa, I would have to take matters into my own hands. Since her attention was elsewhere and she was no longer holding my hand, this was the perfect time to do it. I took my chance and darted away, heading for the exit and the Christmas House. There were at least a dozen reasons why I shouldn't have wandered off, but as a five-year-old on a mission I was not inclined to think about any of them.

I plunged into the crowd of shoppers, dodging and weaving my way through the human mass. I bumped a lot of sides and stepped on countless toes, but I was in too much of a hurry to excuse myself or apologize. Nobody seemed to notice that I was unattended—they were all very busy, and since I wasn't crying or wandering aimlessly, I did not attract attention..

After what seemed like hours I reached the fence around the enclosure and made my way to the back of the line, where I took my place behind a tanned, dark-haired woman accompanied by a boy about my age and a little baby in a stroller.

The line moved along slowly, and it wasn't long before I became very, very impatient. But my desire to talk to Santa was greater than my desire to leave, and the sound of his laugh kept me going. For a while I occupied myself by thinking about how wonderful it would be to meet Santa at last—to have Christmas at last—the way so many of my friends had.

When I was about halfway to Santa my thoughts took a darker turn. I knew I was going to be in deep trouble with Mom when this was over, and Dad wouldn't be happy either. Still, the experience would be worth it, no matter how many lectures I had to listen to. Santa wasn't off-limits just because I was Jewish.

Or maybe he was. Maybe my parents weren't the only ones who would be upset with me. God hadn't made any specific rules about Santa, as far as I knew, but that didn't mean He would be okay with what I was doing. My stomach began to churn with sick dread. Was I committing a sin? Would God be mad at me? It also occurred to me that Santa might know I wasn't Christian. After all, he knew when people were good or bad, right? Maybe he wouldn't even talk to me. He might even decide to chase me away!

So scared was I that I seriously considered getting out of line. But by the time thata thought occurred, there were only a few more people in front of me. I could see Santa clearly from here. The kids he talked to looked so happy. And one of the elves was handing out candy canes—not miniature ones but the standard-size ones. How could I give up and miss that? If I chickened out, I would regret it forever. I put my fears of divine and parental retribution aside, and waited for a short eternity before one of the elves opened the front gate to let me through. At last, I had reached the Christmas House.

"Hello there, little girl," Santa said jovially. "Don't be shy, now." He beckoned me forward with a large gloved hand. Santa was inviting me to sit on his lap! Maybe he didn't know that I was Jewish after all. Or he was so nice that he just didn't mind.

With some trepidation I approached him. A stocky elf lifted me up and placed me on his knee. Santa put his hand on my shoulder and grinned. "What's your name?" he asked me.

I was so overwhelmed that it took me a few seconds to remember, and when I did I could just barely whisper it. "Rebecca. Becky for short," I said. Then, for some reason I can't fathom, I said, "It's nice to meet you."

Santa chuckled. "It's nice to meet you, too. Have you been a good girl this year?"

I gave it some honest thought, because though Santa had just shown that he wasn't omniscient he might still be able to tell if I was lying. "Mostly," I admitted, my voice a little stronger than before. "I tried my best."

"Well, it's good that you're honest," Santa assured me, patting me on the back. I smiled at the compliment. I was starting to enjoy myself. Then he asked The Question. "So Becky, what would you like for Christmas?"

I felt embarrassed for a moment as I realized that, with all the things I had been thinking about, I hadn't gotten around to deciding what I would ask Santa for. It had to be something feasible (no pony, no roller coaster) and something acceptable to my parents (no kitten, no Nintendo). "A Playmobil dollhouse," I said at last.

"Well," Santa said with a twinkle in his eye, "We have a few of those left at the workshop in the North Pole. I'll be sure to give you one on Christmas."

When he said that, I realized that he probably wouldn't be able to give it to me. He gave presents on Christmas Eve, and that required a Christmas the next day. In my house we didn't have Christmas. I must have frowned, because Santa's face suddenly turned serious. "What's wrong?" he asked me.

I bit my lower lip as I felt tears gathering in my eyes. "We haven't got a Christmas tree," I whispered hoarsely. "We've got a chimney and a fireplace but no Christmas tree."

For a moment, Santa was dumbstruck. Looking back, I wonder what the man in the costume was thinking. Maybe he was just acting shocked, I don't know. "No Christmas tree? Well, that's all right, I can still bring presents for you."

I realized that I could not avoid telling him the truth. "No, it's not that…we never have a Christmas tree." I looked down, feeling terribly ashamed of myself. "We're Jewish. We don't have Christmas."

Santa didn't say anything for a few seconds. Was the man in the suit was an experienced mall Santa who had dealt with this kind of problem before, or was the first time he'd faced such a situation? Either way, I pity the poor fellow for having had to deal with five-year-old me. "Oh," he said at last. "Well…maybe it would be a better idea to ask your parents to give you the dollhouse as a Hanukah present." In other words, I would not be on his route come Christmas Eve, no matter what I did. I felt too devastated to cry.

"Thank you anyway," I said, sliding off his lap. "Happy Holidays." The words sounded inane to me even then. Happy Holidays, indeed.

"Happy Holidays to you too," he said, his voice regaining some of its former cheer. Underneath it, though, I could sense some sincerity—Santa wanted me to have a happy holiday despite my disappointment. As if I could. I waved to him and let one of the elves give me a candy cane, after which she escorted me to the exit gate.

The female elf at the gate was more perceptive than anyone else had been thus far, and noticed that nobody was coming to meet me. She looked rather concerned and more than a little annoyed. "Where're your parents, kid?" she asked me.

With a start I realized that quite a long time had passed since I'd left my mother in Bloomingdale's. She was probably hysterical. How was I going to find her among all these people? In my single-minded foolishness I'd gotten myself completely lost. The tears I'd been holding back burst forth and spilled down my cheeks. "I…I don't know!" I sobbed. From where I was standing, things couldn't possibly get any worse.

The elf sighed, took me by the hand and muttered something to the effect that they got a few like me every year.

Fifteen minutes and one public announcement later, my mother arrived to collect me from the mall security office. I was sucking on the candy cane the elf had given me but was hardly able to taste it through my misery. I had finished crying a while ago—my cheeks were streaked with tears, my eyes were red and puffy and my throat was sore. "Becky!" my mother nearly shouted as she knelt before my chair and put her hands on my arms. She didn't look as angry as I'd expected. "Where were you? I went looking all over for you!"

It was impossible for me to lie to my mother. I told her the whole sordid story, from beginning to end. At some point during my narrative I started crying again. "I'm sorry I ran off!" I bawled. "I really wanted to see Santa…I thought you wouldn't let me…I'll never do it again, I swear!" I began to sob.

My mother hugged me and shushed me, getting sticky candy-cane stuff on her sweater in the process. "It's okay, it's okay," she said. "I would have let you visit Santa later. You have to learn to wait for things," she told me, not for the first time. "Anyway," she continued in a near-whisper, "Santa's not real. That was just a man in a suit."

The flow of tears halted. I looked up at my mother questioningly. "But then where do the presents come from?"

Mom smiled at me. "The parents put gifts under the tree while the kids are sleeping," she said. "We don't have pretend like that."

Santa Claus wasn't real! It wasn't that he didn't give presents to Jewish kids, he didn't exist in the first place! I smiled with relief. "No Santa?" I asked, needing to be absolutely sure.

"No Santa," my mother replied. "You can get presents without Santa. Now let's go home. We've both had a very long day, and the mall closes in half an hour."

On the way back to the parking lot, Mom trusted me to follow her and didn't hold my hand. Our route took us by the Christmas House again. At first I refused to look at it, but when we got right up close, I could not resist doing so. The line of parents and children had dispersed; Santa and his elves were gone. The empty, now forlorn house seemed like it was about to be swallowed up in the flood of shoppers.

I shook my head, turned my back on the little house and followed my mother home.

Comments

[r-grayjoy.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow, I love it! Great storytelling; I love how the beauty and splendor of Christmas abruptly turns fake and shallow. Your voice in this is great as well -- it's very much an adult remembering what it's like to view things from the eyes of a five-year-old. Wonderful descriptive writing. :)