If you’re reading this, you probably know I’m a Jew.
Which means I don’t celebrate Christmas.
Ever.
Christmas to me has always been Chinese food and movies. Why, yesterday we hit up two films—the somewhat excellent “Big Eyes” and the somewhat putrid “Into the Woods.” Which was fine and dandy and cool and excellent.
And yet …
I missed the cold on Christmas. I really did. Which is so weird, because I don’t celebrate Christmas and I don’t like the cold. But there’s something … off about palm trees and Christmas. They just don’t go together, and I’ve never experienced a holiday season that feels less like a holiday season than this one. Again, I probably shouldn’t mind. I don’t believe the virgin Mary had a son. But as the years have passed, and I morphed from resentful Jew in a Christian town to Jew in a pretty Jewish town to, well, my present incarnation of an indifferent guy on the West Coast, I find myself longing the snowfall and glistening trees and stiff wind. Not permanently, mind you, but for a couple of days.
The truth is (and I rarely admit this), I genuinely love Christmas. It’s a beautiful holiday that—even when it misses the mark and focuses more on commercialism than Christ—seems to bring families together over eggnog and fireplaces. Yeah, it’s not my holiday. But it’s something I enjoy observing.
Just not as much when it’s 75 degrees and sunny.
