I was the senior medical officer at the Navy hospital on the Marine Corps Base at 29 Palms, California, in the ’80s.
On my officer’s bowling team was the base commander and his lovely wife from Alabama. Christmas was just a week away. The general’s wife asked me what plans I had for the holidays.
I told her that Jewish doctors usually stand the watch over Christmas, but I was celebrating Chanukah this whole past week.
She smiled and said, “Oh, that’s right, that is how you Jews celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus.”
Days later, I spotted her in the commissary and gave her a synopsis of the history of Chanukah. She accepted the information in a gracious manner befitting a graduate of the University of Alabama.
Bruce S. Steir is a retired physician in San Francisco.