CW: antisemitism mention.
Something I can’t stop thinking about lately is a talk that my spouse and I had back on December 18th, the first night of Chanukkah...you see, we had two Chanukkiah, or Chanukkah Menorah - the lamps with the eight candles plus the one helper candle that you light. You’re supposed to have one per person in your household. And you’re supposed to put at least one in the window where the most people can see it if you can. It IS “The Festival of Lights” after all, right?
The issue that we had, though, was how visibly Jewish did we want to appear to the public? Because we had to consider the high rate of antisemitic hate crimes in the area. We could put one in the window facing the apartment courtyard…which we did do for the first 2 nights. But then not a whole lot of people would see it.
So on the third night, we decided to switch it to our main front window that faces the street. We came to the conclusion that it would be okay since our building in particular has security cameras outside the building. And because we just didn’t want to have that feeling of living in fear.
I think what really was the deciding factor was when we went out to go get the mail earlier that evening together and we looked up and saw our neighbors Christmas tree in their window. And we realized that they don’t have to worry about this kind of thing. Not even a little bit.
To some people it might seem silly - a tiny little Chanukkiah in the window of an apartment window slowly gaining a light over the course of eight days. But to those who know and who understand the real stories and history of Chanukkah…those lights mean so much more. Those lights mean resilience. They mean hope in the darkness.
