Growing Up Jewish in Texas: Christmas
Posted: 12/25/2013 1:15 pm
I was born and raised in Houston, Texas.
I am third of eight children.
My parents were both Jewish, as am I.
Yet every year we celebrated Christmas.
Is this puzzling? It wasn't at all puzzling to me and my siblings.
Every Christmas, the family bought a Christmas tree, and we all joined in decorating it with lights, ornaments, and tinsel.
Every Christmas morning, we woke up like a noisy tribe about 5 a.m. and rushed to discover that we all had presents under the tree.
Why did our Jewish family celebrate Christmas?
To begin with, my parents had been born into observant Jewish families. My father was born in Savannah, Georgia, where he was the youngest of nine children and the only boy. He was spoiled rotten, left high school without graduating, and tried (but failed) to make it in vaudeville as a hoofer and comedian. My mother was born in Bessarabia and came to America at the end of World War I as a nine-year-old girl with her mother and little sister. They traveled on a ship (the "Savoie") loaded with returning American soldiers, then made their way to Houston to meet my grandfather, who was a tailor and had come to America before the war broke out.
What my parents wanted most was to be seen as "real Americans." My mother was especially zealous about wanting to speak perfect English (she arrived speaking only Yiddish). She was very proud that she earned a high school diploma from the Houston