Chanuka in the Locked Ward
By Shani Silverstein
Reprinted with permission from Aish.com
“Merry Christmas, Shani!”' Paul flashed a wide smile at me and bobbed his head up and down, making his dirty blonde dreadlocks bounce enthusiastically.
"I don't celebrate that holiday,” I said tightly, nervously fingering the top button of my buttoned-up oxford shirt .
There were two things wrong with this little scenario, far as I was concerned. One, he mentioned that holiday that was part of a foreign religion. Two, he was a guy, I was a girl and we shouldn't have been talking. About anything. Period.
Paul looked puzzled. He wrinkled his nose and peered at me quizzically,
"Why not?”
I had enough of the conversation and just walked away. You could get away with doing things like that in psychiatric units.
Just as soon as I'd walked off, I sneaked a quick peek backwards, taking in Paul's retreating figure, Grateful Dead T-shirt, faded, ripped jeans and all. He was a rather nice looking fellow. That is if you looked. I jerked my head forward, reminding myself for the thousandth time who I was. The part that I was sure of, that is. Most of who I was was quite the mystery to me.
But I did know that I was a good Chassidic girl from Boro Park and good Chassidic girls did not talk to boys nor talk about Christmas.
Glad to have gotten that conversation out of the way, I studiously continued walking down the corridors, and around the main section of the unit, towards nowhere. Having completed a circle, I began again. For the dozenth time. I was homesick and sad. I missed my bed and my privacy. I missed parents and my 11 brothers and sisters. And I missed Chanukah.
It's not that the unit staff hadn't tried. Some effort had been put in. There were cheap paper banners with the words “Happy Hanukkah” and a thin blue Star of David at either end, strewn across the unit. On the other side of the large, plastic, green Christmas tree with the tinsel decorations in red, green and silvery purple, there was a small table with the remainders of the oily donuts we had been treated to after dinner that day. And in the nurses' station, there was a stout, white plastic menorah with wide branches and electric flame shaped bulbs on top of each one.
Maybe it was Hanukkah. But it certainly wasn't Chanukah...