A Christmas Tree for Hanukkah

My name is Mari Pack, and I’m an editor for Guideposts. My story is about my mother, who is not Jewish, but she married my father, who is, and my brother and I were raised Jewish.

So, my mother, in raising us Jewish, didn’t celebrate Christmas or Christian holidays for a long time. She didn’t have a Christmas tree in our house. And so, my brother and I, after we graduated college, decided that it would be a really nice thing to make decorations for a Christmas tree and present her with a little Christmas tree during the holidays.

And so we happened to do that on Hanukkah. Growing up Jewish, without a Jewish mother, is kind of a funny process. A lot of things were experiments for my mother, like making brisket or lighting Hanukkah candles or fasting on Yom Kippur. These were all things that she hadn’t done growing up and she hadn’t taken a class or done any sort of conversion ritual. And so it was just, for her, kind of this wild experiment of learning to do all these things for us.

Putting together the tree was kind of an adventure. It must have been like what doing Judaism felt like for my mother–in the beginning, especially–is that you’re kind of just experimenting and so you’re kind of doing what you’ve seen other people do. You’re doing what you’ve seen on TV and in movies, and it kinda feels like maybe you’re probably doing it wrong.

It definitely felt that way for me. I’d buy little Santas and then I’d go home and paint them, or I’d buy clear baubles and then, “Ok, I’m gonna put some glitter glue on these, that’s probably right.” Or “I’m gonna string together some lights and some popcorn.” And, like, that was sort of the way we put the tree together. It was just like, “What do I know from the movie The Grinch, vintage 1950s Christmas postcards, and then, like, the movie White Christmas? And I’ll just combine all those things,” and it actually turned out really well.

My mother cried when we showed her the Christmas tree, and I didn’t expect that. I know that seems a little obvious now, that she would be emotionally overwhelmed, but at the time I just thought, “Oh, she’ll love it.” And she did, but when she came into the house, you know, it’d been a long day of work, so we’re all sort of like, “How are you doing? I hope you had a nice day.” And she came in and she just dropped what she was carrying and just cried.

I think it was a huge relief for her in a lot of ways. I mean, I think she knew without us having to tell her what we were saying is, “We love you and thank you for everything you’ve sacrificed to raise my brother and I.” But also this idea of you can sort of do whatever you want now. Like, your spiritual life is yours to completely control in whatever way you wish. And if that means having a Christmas tree, awesome.

And she has. Every year since, she’s put up the Christmas tree and the ornaments that we made. Which now that I look at that … at the time I thought, “Oh, these ornaments are so beautiful, and they’re such a representation of how much I love my mother.” And looking at them now I’m like, “Oh, these are definitely starter ornaments,” but she uses them. She loves them, and it’s our gift to her, and it’s great.