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Friday, December 11, 2009

Random Thoughts as a Jewish Girl Does Christmas and Chanukah Too

I'm in mid-brownie baking mode and my brain is fried. Every moment is consumed with melting and mixing and cutting and bagging and boxing and labeling then driving to the post office where I am a whiz at the very cool APC (Automated Postal Center) and then coming home and starting all over again. Coherent thoughts are few and far between.
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The fact that I know the name of the self-serve machine in the lobby of the post office gives you some idea of how I've been spending my time lately.
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My mind is filled with conversations. It's reminding me of putting books onto library shelves in a new house. The characters are adjusting to their new neighbors and I'm talking to the recipients and yes it's all a bit .... can I actually be thinking of using this word???..... surreal but is it possible that you might know what I mean? I'm choosing cards carefully and my box of bubble-wrap-on-a-roll is my new best friend and I'm grinning from ear to ear as I chatter to my friends in my head.
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Tucson has no place to shop for the kinds of paper goods that I use up every single year. I'm talking about cellophane bags and interesting curling ribbon and a wide variety of stickers and gift cards and small but fabulous inexpensive but aren't you thoughtful evoking gifts. In Marin, I'd spend hours in Ideal Stationers. Here, I'm considering a run to Wally-World....... though they totally ignore Hanukah... which is annoying.
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And that's a nice segue into my stereotypically, who shops more than a Jewish girl? rant. As I open box after box of fabulous Christmas decorations and shrug at the small carton of sort-of-okay-but-I'm-really-not-that-excited-to-see-them Chanukah decorations, I say to you, merchants of the world, that if you make it I will buy it. I promise. Just be sure it's not plastic and doesn't have a flannel backing and if you could manage to tone down the blue just a touch from that nearly-neon hue so favored by the few who've taken pity on me and created something anything oh, come on I want to shop.

As I said earlier, coherent thoughts are few and far between.
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There are 2 little girls, about 8 and 10 years old, sitting in the first row behind the television announcers as Syracuse starts the second half against the Florida 'Gators. They are wearing Florida colored Santa hats and they have their arms outstretched as far as they can go in front of themselves and they are clapping their open palms against one another .. you know..... being 'gators . They are having such a good time I'm not even going to think about the fact that it's 10pm on a school night and they are not home in bed.
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Florida's St. Pete Times Forum must have had a more mellifluous name at one point, don't you think??? And how would you have spelled mellifluous? I had issues, I assure you. And I am a good speller.
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I never understood why people would ask if spelling counts? What were they going to do? Mis-spell on purpose? Didn't everyone always try to do everything right? Were they looking for permission to write without thinking? How did they do that? I'm still confused.
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It's time to put in 3 more pans of brownies. Thanks for the lovely interlude.
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4 comments:

  1. Sounds like you've come to Tucson from elsewhere. Read your earlier ongoing saga about Christmas. Reminded me of neighbors, long since moved to S.F. area, whose children were the envy my own, because they celebrated Hanukkah and Christmas.

    On a recent TGB piece I shared in a comment my own current holiday experience which has been unique for me, especially this year.

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  2. I've done Christmases in Cleveland and Chicago and Northern California and I'm still not used to the lack of snow..... though I've been without it for nearly 20 years.

    Thanks for sharing.

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  3. always makes me think of that song "stuck in the middle with you". every year without fail i find the christmas part hard. we have a blended family, i am the jewish one, my kids are the jewish ones, his are not and yet, here is the funny part, my family is not jewish, i am a convert. and so i am truly stuck in the middle. as my 32 year old daughter always says, mom, it's just a tree and then my 90 year old mother says oh thank you for the tree and i think, it's more than a tree.

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  4. I can't imagine your inner turmoil. YES, it's more than a tree.... but it took me decades of doing it to realize that.

    Holiday wishes to you, margie...... all the holidays!
    a/b

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