The True Meaning of Holidays

It's about to be an interesting time to be a Catholic-raised Jewess. Or at least for me, specifically. As tends to happen every now and then, Passover and Easter are falling at the same time.

Passover begins on Wednesday night, and I, of course, would like to attend a seder. Passover seems like one of the handful of holidays you simply can't get away with celebrating alone. Depriving yourself of your favorite kinds of carbs (and don't forget that pesky kitniyot) doesn't seem nearly as worth it when you can't kick off the celebration with family, friends, and an over-the-top seder with all the necessary four glasses of wine. However, being the daughter of a lapsed convert--an only child to a single parent, might I add--there is simply no one to have a seder with. My family isn't Jewish. I didn't grow up Jewish, so I don't have friends at home whose families could invite my orphaned mother and me to join them. And my mother's friends seem to be spread all across the country in places where it would be entirely inconvenient to join them.

So, as it stands right now, we may likely be spending Passover alone. I won't even try to fake my own seder-for-two at our kitchen table. I'm all for tradition, of course, but I would even take my buddy's family seder--a family that calls themselves "Jew-ish"--complete with pasta, bread, and any other prohibited Italian foods within reach, over no celebration at all. This lack of seder scheduling doesn't seem to phase my mother, a lapsed Jew of sorts, but as someone exploring her faith, I'm saddened to be missing out.

On the other hand, I grew up celebrating all the Christian holidays. We host Christmas Eve every year and my mom gets mad if she doesn't get at least a card from me for Easter. And now that Easter is on Sunday, there's an expectation that we will be celebrating. We won't. Or at least not in any conventional sense of the word.

So I said my family isn't Jewish. They also aren't terribly functional. When your immediate family is made up of two people, plus my godfather--who is family but likes to leave before holiday meals in order to beat traffic--it's difficult to justify holiday feasts. My mother's only sibling has no relationship with her whatsoever, and after my grandmother passed away, we were left with no real blood relatives to share such occasions with. Though we've been lucky to share Thanksgiving and Christmas Day with loving friends every year, there's still something inherently awkward about waiting around to be asked to join.

So I've gotten to thinking. What is so special about holidays anyway? Of course, I understand the religious and cultural significance of the holidays themselves, but why have we selected what is in some cases an arbitrary date (as some argue about Christmas, but I won't even begin that debate) to get together and celebrate it? Why do we all have to clear our schedules for Sunday because that is the day that has been decided for us as the time when we will gather together and celebrate? Personally, I'm much more fond of the way we celebrate birthdays--sometimes on the day, sometimes on the nearest weekend, and others whenever it's most convenient for all parties. I understand why it's impossible to treat religious and national holidays in the same way, but for those of us who may be forced to twiddle our thumbs on the day when everyone else is feasting, try something new! Throw an Easter part two for friends and family you can't see on the actual day and celebrate the togetherness, not the calendar day. Because after all, holidays were never supposed to be about an exact moment in time, they're supposed to be about the experiences you have.