Friday, December 4, 2009

Goyification




Tonight I completed the “goyification” of the house. That’s what my husband, who is Jewish, calls decorating the house for Christmas. He marvels at how long it takes to get the house ready for the holidays and lately, I’m becoming more aware of it, too.

Take, for instance, the other day. While the menfolk were at work and school, I managed to get the large, cumbersome faux Christmas tree down from the attic while the 4-year old was playing here with her friend. I also managed to get the lights and ornaments down and assemble the tree. I was pretty proud of myself. My daughter’s friend, who had been mourning the fact that her family doesn’t celebrate Christmas, saw all the effort and declared, “That’s too much work!” Ah, another case of goy-envy nipped in the bud.

Later, after The Boy got home from school, we managed to decorate said tree. This, despite the fact that he was screaming his guts out because the Diva had managed to erase the scores on one of his DS games (“Do you KNOW how hard I worked on that?” he wailed. “No,” I thought, “I try not to think about how that stupid machine rots your brain and takes you away from constructive activities like, say, reading War & Peace. And I try not to think about what a stupid posterior of a mom I am for letting you play the bloody thing!”). After the tree was decorated, my kids INSISTED on posing for holiday card pictures under the tree wearing Santa hats. If that isn’t schizophrenic behavior, I don’t know what is. And note that even though everything on our cards screams “Christmas” I did manage to sneak in some clip art of a menorah as a nod to my husband and his traditions.

Today, while The Boy was home with strep (giving him ample excuse to play the DS and me quasi-valid excuse to let him), I put up the Christmas lights. Sounds easy, but by the time I checked to make sure that everything is working and remember how the timer works (where ARE those instructions), hours have passed. And I really could write a book called How To Rig Up A Holiday Display When Pieces Were Lost Or Broken Last Year.

So hubby will come home tonight and know that the goyification of the house is complete. It waits for our menorah in the window to add even more light next week. Yes, I do the light display for the kids. But I also do it for me. There’s nothing like coming home on a dark night and seeing the glow from your own yard (secure in the knowledge that it’s not from your house being ablaze from one of your home cooked meals). And I hope that people who pass by our house “Oooh” and “Ahhh.” Tis’ the season of light!




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