Menorahs

On Menorahs

The first time I lit a menorah was in the East Village, and I lit every candle to surprise the man who would become my husband.

I thought about all lights like birthday cake candles, and I loved the way the menorah looked glittering on the glass table in our loft on 12th street.

No, no he said, when he walked in the door. You light just one.

How disappointing!

I commenced study of Judaic traditions. My future sister in law had become FRUM, which is like the German word FROMM meaning pious. She had become an orthodox Jew and gave me a bunch of complicated books about Jewish ritual. I got to the part where you waved chicken over your head, and stopped reading. My friend Janie Glick, who lived on Central Park, did NOT – to my knowledge -- wave a chicken over her head in her penthouse, nor did my classmates from Nightingale Bamford wave a chicken over their heads to my recollection. The Jews I knew were sedate and extremely high-toned. Until I met Sy Metzger, whose family was – sort of communist, lived in Stuyvesant Town, and worked in the garment industry. They were very Jewish, but they didn’t go to temple or celebrate any holidays.

So the mystery of the menorah persisted for a long time. What WAS correct? Eventually I got married and had a daughter and the children’s books on being Jewish were pretty helpful. You have to light a new candle every night to grow the miracle. Hmm, I always thought miracles were kind of PRESTO like a magic trick, so this was a new idea.

But now that I knew what I was supposed to do, there was still the problem of the wax. The candles invariably went lopsided in their little holders. As it turned out, I was RIGHT to light them all at once, because the agony of lighting one more lopsided – oh my god it’s going to fall over and burn the place down — candle was very stressful. I battled the wax problem: I bought menorah after menorah. I made one out of clay (like the dreidel song!); I did a ceramics one at color me mine. It didn’t matter. Every model produced the same defective result. Wax dripping everywhere – the cleaning of the menorah with toothpicks, plastic knives, or -- as Janie suggested -- boiling hot water.

All futile.

Sometimes being Jewish is very frustrating. According to orthodox rabbis, I’m not even really Jewish (I converted with reform rabbis). That’s like being told your driver's license is only good in say, Passaic (not that I mind Passaic). I don’t have an automatic right to return to Israel – which has increased my already strong sympathy for my fellow wannabe returnees, the Palestinians. My daughter isn’t really “Jewish” either. This makes me furious.

On the other hand, my last name is HAMMER, so I kind of am a Maccabee already. And anyone can tell, you, I don’t like ANYBODY messing with my peeps, be they my family, my friends, my colleagues, or my students. One student likened me to Bat Man, and I suspect he has the dark knight in mind, rather than the pleasant guy we saw on the TV when some of us were young.

So I’ll light the candles, I’ll consent to my quasi-contested inclusion in Jewishness. But this year, I’m junking the candle wax. We have a recycled motherboard that is green and that you attach to a battery and you flick a new switch every night. So totally a Jewish nerd kind of thing.

Is it halachically correct???

Hell no, but neither am I.

So as I flick the first switch I will envision a world where everyone can return to the place they belong, in peace, freedom, joy, and light.