Christmas tree envy

Now that Thanksgiving has passed and snow has fallen, the time has come in which little Jewish girls from semi-Southern states begin to long for Christmas trees.

I, too, used to suffer from this affliction. In my case, this desire was very specific. I didn't think so much of the tree itself — the menorah with its twinkling lights and dripping wax was just as much fun — nor of the gifts under it — every child understands that eight days of presents are preferable to just one. My interest was purely aesthetic. I just wanted to help decorate a Christmas tree.

Maybe this wayward urge came from a feeling of missing out. For as long as I can remember, I was aware that every other child in my grade school classes participated in this ritual that to me seemed strange and wonderful. They had some kind of use for the cotton ball snowman ornaments that we made in arts and crafts. In my house, the closest such an offering could come to a tree was to be taped up to a door that was certainly wood, but had probably never even met an evergreen.

The longing to decorate a tree was made even more awkward by knowing that such a desire on my part was probably inappropriate and possibly perverse. In the same vein, I was always embarrassed to admit that I enjoyed my holiday concerts better before West Virginia public schools discovered political correctness. Trying to give Hanukah songs a more prominent place on the program just meant emphasizing how little good Hanukah music there is. Heavily religious lyrics aside, I preferred songs of sleigh bells and snowflakes to inane verses on latkes and dreidels, but felt guilty saying so.

After growing up in this atmosphere, I was pleased to discover that Christmas time is one of the best times for a Jewish exchange student to be in a foreign country. Most people I tell about my year in northeastern Italy are shocked that I spent Christmas away from my family, but the truth remains that this holiday is of little significance to non-Christians. While some of my exchange student friends suffered serious nostalgia for home, family, friends, and their own traditions, I rolled through December in a state of wide-eyed euphoria, trying to take in all the new traditions around me.

First, there was the series of town fairs. Nominally in honor of local saints, these fairs were actually a collection of vendors lining the closed-to-traffic streets of the centro that attracted throngs of people, from the town, from the nearby area, and at least one curious American. Every weekend I wandered past booths offering clothing, linens, games, toys and even pets. My favorite wares, though, were the edibles: cheeses and prepared meats, wine and beer, cookies, cakes, candied nuts and other sweets. There were also dinky carnival rides that you recognized from weekend to weekend and were scared to ride on but did anyway, hoping that neither your parents or your host parents would find out.

Then there were the traditions of the holiday. I ate pandoro and panettone, two types of golden, buttery cake, both at home and when I visited friends. I tried, and failed, to learn Italian Christmas songs. I dragged my host family to midnight mass, even though they traditionally attend the eleven o'clock morning service, and then sat in a café with them afterwards, drinking espresso and sending "Tanti auguri di buon Natale!" and "Merry Christmas!" text messages. I celebrated Santo Stefano, Dec. 26, with a fish feast with my second host family.

But the best part of my Christmas in Italy was decorating, for the first time, my own tree. I returned from visiting a friend in Austria a week and a half before the holiday to find my first host family's tree already bedecked. I was crushed, since I had specifically asked them to wait for me, and tried, with little success, to resign myself to my tinsel-less fate. Then, the phone rang. It was the mother from my second host family.

"When are you coming over?" she asked me.

"Cosa?" I replied, confused. "What? What for?"

"To decorate the tree," she told me. "We waited especially for you."

The next day, we went to work with strings of metallic ribbon and red and gold globe ornaments. It was a small tree, simply done, but I thought it beautiful. From that day on I ceased to long for my own pine. By including me in a tradition I had always watched from the outside, by making me an integral part of her ritual and therefore her family, my host mother had resolved forever my Christmas tree envy. Apparently, it's all just a question of belonging. Emily Stolzenberg is a German major from Morgantown, W. Va. She can be reached at estolzen@princeton.edu.