A Nice Jewish Girl Hanging Holly
Finding community and belonging where I least expected it
Mark and I followed my mom into the clubhouse. As the long-time head of her condo community’s social committee, she was in charge of the evening’s event, Christmas decorating. It was the perfect job for her, I thought, aside from the fact that we’re Jewish.
Inside, the clubhouse was holding onto the early ‘00s harder than I was, with its over-sized upholstered couches that were overdue to be re-upholstered. Tall windows along the back wall looked out on a ravine, but now that the sun had set, they just reflected the strands of lights waiting to be hung.
“We’ve brought the youth!”
My mom announced our entrance to the room full of neighbors, mostly well north of 70.
It sounded funny to hear out loud, but moving in with my parents while Mark and I wait for our new house to be finished has, in not-so-gentle ways, made me feel like a kid again. Even when hot flashes and body aches remind me of my age, Mark is there to play into the role, though sometimes I’m not sure he’s playing at anything.
Ball jokes are his specialty
We were barely through the door when — spotting a tub of oversized ornaments — he launched a classic: “Look at those giant balls.” It was going to be one of those nights. But no one even looked up.
Our marriage is long past the stage where he needs to see me blush at his quips, or where I need to elbow him into silence. We just tossed our coats on a faded wingback chair and got on with the job we were recruited for.
“Last year someone came in and saw all these seniors up on ladders and freaked out,” my mom said earlier in the week, her way of inviting us to take part in the event. At 51, Mark and I were up for any activity where we were deemed the young ones.
“Fred, get down from there! That’s what I brought the kids for,” my mom said as the man whose 90th birthday party my parents had just attended reached up from the top of a ladder to place a sparkly snowflake on the Christmas tree. I’ve been told several times now — with awe — that Fred went zip lining as part of his celebration.
Based on how many people were standing around chatting, it was clear this decorating event was mostly a social one, but Mark and I were there to work.
We assessed the room like fire marshals.
Clocking four ladders, all of them in use, we split up, heading for the two tallest threats. Mark chose the tree where Fred’s wife Jane, 87, was spotting him from the ground, her unsteady arms reaching up in the general direction of Fred’s back side.
I headed to the fireplace where Dennis, who I’d met minutes earlier, was atop the other tall ladder, clearing off non-Christmas décor from the high mantle.
Nothing makes me more comfortable in a social situation than being given a job.
“You better come down from there before I get in trouble,” I said, reaching to support the ladder, which, I realized, was neither steady nor flat on the ground. Unfazed by the wobble — and quite possibly taunting me with it — Dennis looked down at me the way my kids do when I tell them to drive safe or eat a vegetable once in a while.
Back on the ground, Dennis handed me a decorative candleholder and a wadded-up bunch of paper towels. “It’s pretty gross up there,” he said. “Not sure it’s ever been cleaned.”
I’m pretty sure Dennis doesn’t know how gross things can get.
In recent years, I’ve moved my sons in and out of nine different dorm rooms and apartments. I’ve tackled appetite-killing refrigerators and bathroom floors that would have brought me to my knees had I not been afraid of catching something from the contact. That’s what I call gross!
Paper towels in hand, I climbed the ladder and tried to ignore the constant wobble while I cleared off the mantle’s thick layer of dust and the bits and bobs from Christmases past.
Becky, a friendly woman in my mom’s knitting group, handed up a garland decorated with ribbons, pinecones, and lights. I leaned in hoping for a hint of fresh pine, or even that Home Depot tang, but instead got a musty brush against my cheek and the sting of a scratch.
My job — to drape the garland across the mantle — seemed easy enough.
But when I looked back down at Becky — who was now joined by two other women — for approval, I realized maybe it wasn’t.
“Turn this part that way.”
“No, the other way.”
“More to the left.”
“The other left.”
Eventually one of them said it was “fine,” which did nothing for the imposter-syndrome vibes my brain was pumping out like Christmas music on Black Friday. I wanted to mention that I had never done this before, but I was afraid it was already pretty obvious.
My awkwardness was reaching first-open-casket-funeral levels.
I drifted around the room, re-straightening bows that didn’t need it, hoping to find big balls to hang or fake presents to arrange. That’s when I found myself in front of the Christmas tree.
“Does it look okay without anything at the top or should we put this ribbon up there?” a woman I hadn’t met yet asked me. She held up a frayed length of crumbled fabric. I just stared like it was Mark’s poor old Grandma Liz in the coffin wearing too much rouge.
Clearly, this crowd wasn’t as concerned as I was about my lack of experience, but I didn’t feel comfortable answering a question with top-of-the-Christmas-tree magnitude. At that point, I was just praying no one handed me a box marked “Nativity,” because I would have somehow made it look like a petting zoo.
I climbed back up the ladder as Becky and her cohorts excavated a wreath that she said belonged on the mantle, too. I considered asking where they planned on putting the menorah, which I doubt even existed.
But then, from my shaky perch, I noticed my dad holding court with a group of men who, like him, were only there because they’d walked their wives over and had nothing else better to do. He was in his element, keeping their attention with a joke he’d probably heard on Johnny Carson.
And then there was my mom, surrounded by helpers eager for her instructions and opinions. I realized that creating an uncomfortable moment just to make a point wouldn’t be the kindest thing to do to my parents, who, over the last 9 years living here had developed a solid group of friends in this community.
With the wreath now perched on the mantle and looking “ok,” I climbed down and walked back to the Christmas tree, where Mark had taken Fred’s place on the ladder. People we’d only ever waved anonymously at while walking our dogs were calling out Mark’s name and joking with him as they handed up one giant ball after another.
He smiled like a little kid as he hung them on the branches at the top of the tree.
