It was our first Chanukah away from home. Just me, my wife and child. Instead of Memphis, Tenn., where December days were a nifty 50 degrees, we were at Iowa State University in Ames, where old cars didn’t start after October — at least mine didn’t. And Frosty the Snowman had set up shop in the living room of our Quonset hut. On wintry Iowa mornings, I couldn’t wait for my first class in a warm, well-heated classroom.
To us, Memphis — looked upon by New Yorkers as a land of white bread, bologna and Anglo-Saxons — was Zion itself. We grew up on a Jewish island, socially isolated from the Christian tide that surrounded us. We were, so to speak, a kreplach in a bowl of grits.
But when we got to the Midwest, we could find no visible Jewish community. It may have been flourishing in that black Iowa dirt that grew corn as tall as trees, but we never saw it. Maybe, with working and studying, we just didn’t have the time. So for the first and only time in our lives, we were unaffiliated.
That’s why we set our sights on a grand Chanukah, our first away from home. We’d show ’em — we’d have the best Chanukah since the Maccabees dined on latkes at the victory party.
While I was struggling with my studies, the wife worked in the cafeteria line. (Not a bad job, I thought, the cafeteria is well-heated.) She was a potato-dipping specialist, scooping up globs of potatoes to dump on passing trays. Marksmanship was important. You had to hit the open spot on the plate between the hamburger steak and the strawberry Jell-O. A miss created a Jell-O sundae with mashed potato topping. Jell-O lovers hated it. It was definitely a semi-skilled job.
We needed her paycheck because the holiday season (Christmas to our friends, Chanukah to us) would soon be upon us. Presents and some mild social activities would have to be financed. We needed to carefully budget for the extra expenses, like a few simple presents for our son and maybe if our resources allowed, a party for our Christian classmates.
Nothing fancy: latkes and applesauce washed down with that Iowa favorite, Iron City beer. And a few rounds of dreidel games ought to liven things up, I thought. We couldn’t play for money because none of us had any. Candy, like Hershey’s Kisses in silver wrappers, worked well as a substitute.
So with a little deprivation, in early fall we were well-prepared for Chanukah. The only trouble, as we explained to our Midwestern neighbors, is that the holiday featured eight days of gifts, not one, like Christmas. But with some forethought, you could stretch the excitement and your wallet. If Christmas is a hot fudge, marshmallow nut sundae, Chanukah is a scoop of vanilla ice cream the first night, a few nuts the second night, then the third night some chocolate syrup…You get the idea.
For our chocolate sundae we chose a $2.98 wind-up train. The first night we gave him the engine, then the next day a flat car and on the last night of Chanukah, the caboose. It was a great lesson in life for the child, I thought; Rome wasn’t built in a day, you know.
Each night we lit the ceremonial candles and watched that train spin around a track that would have fit on a coffee table (if we had a coffee table). When we got dizzy from watching the train, we’d tell the story of the glorious Maccabee victory and fantasize about next Chanukah, when we’d have a degree and a job and a much bigger train.
We spent a lot of that week sitting around the small railroad track on the linoleum floor of the living room. It was just we three. The room, for a change, was strangely warm. To this day, we’ve never had a better Chanukah.