It's not like the big holiday, nor like the Passover or Sukkot vacation, and maybe that's why we didn't have time to prepare in advance. The children's holiday of Chanukah falls on you suddenly, without camp and without lunch.
A few days of vacation without a well-organized and pre-arranged plan (except for the daily candle lighting). We didn't do anything grandiose together, and maybe that's why I had so much time to look at them from the sidelines. Just observe. Not only them but many more parents with many more children who took them last Hanukkah to work, to the grocery store, to the bank, to run errands, to the mall, to traffic jams. To summarize this observation, that is, to summarize the Hanukkah holiday, here are some of my conclusions about the children of Israel:
1.
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They are slower than us. In fact, this is perhaps the main feature that distinguishes children from adults. After all, they also know, thank God, to put on socks and shoes and a coat and walk out the door of the house. It just takes them much longer. They also know how to say what they want for dinner, or finish eating what they asked for, it's just not as purposeful and focused and agile as we are.
I once read an article about how the word we say to our children the most is the word "Well!" Check it out. After all, what we see as a purely technical task on the way somewhere, for example getting into the car, is seen by them not as a means but as an end, as a complete experience in itself. There are buttons for the elevator, and there's also a big mirror inside, and here's a neighbor getting into the elevator and here's he getting out, and here in the parking lot there are still a lot of cars. So how can we talk only about "getting into the car"? Why not really dwell on all these wonders of creation, and then also remember that they need to go to the bathroom and go up again?
2.
They can behave nicely, the question is when exactly. Sometimes they behave wonderfully, don't fight, are generous to each other and create a peaceful atmosphere of perfect family harmony in the house. Sometimes they really don't. And the bigger problem is that you can't schedule these times in advance. You can't really schedule them in advance to play nicely when you have a long phone call or intense work on the computer.
And by the way, maybe it's corny, but I can't help but compare myself as a father to my heavenly father. After all, what's more satisfying than seeing them get along and give up? And what's more frustrating than seeing them fight with selfishness and aggression? Is that really how God looks at us, His children? During a family gathering on a holiday, for example, a situation arose in which a relative gave two of my children a chocolate coin. He left them like that, faced with this poignant dilemma, and walked away. The second they looked at the coin, I suddenly realized that there was a very specific kind of frustration I would feel if they started saying "This is mine" and "No, this is mine!" and a very specific kind of happiness that would overwhelm me if one of them said "Take it, I give up, this is yours.".
3.
And sometimes they behave well, but the mall doesn't. When we left one of our country's malls this week, exhausted and worn out, I thought about what we had been through and realized that the kids were actually adorable. Really. It's just the mall. So much noise, so many clowns, so many shows, so many stores, so many stalls, so many glowing toys, so many food-colored donuts, and so many parents and kids like us. It was so crowded that we found ourselves standing in line for the escalators(!). It was one big attention deficit disorder. An organized and loud attack on all the senses, and especially on my wallet.
In one of the climaxes, a giant Cheetos doll attacked us. It scared the little one, it excited the older one until we had to agree that he would also take a picture with it, stand in line (half an hour, for the little one) to get a magnet with his picture with his new friend on it, and at the end he would also receive a small pack of Cheetos as a gift (then the little one who was scared would want some too, and it would all start over).
4.
They are full of joy. They are just looking for an opportunity for real, free, rolling, and unceasing laughter. Not from jokes with a resounding punch but from just little things that happen along the way. When did that go away, actually? Why don't adults laugh like that?
5.
I really don't care that they're noisy. A baby crying in a public place doesn't bother me that much, as long as it's not my baby. Two siblings arguing loudly don't bother me, as long as they're not my own children. Really? It's even nice to see other people's children fighting a little too. That's why I don't understand why it's so stressful for other parents that their children are noisy. Sometimes I really feel like telling someone who's rushing to run and fix the problem: "Ma'am, it's okay, it doesn't bother us, we were all just checking that it wasn't our baby. Your baby can just keep crying happily.".
6.
They are a miracle. A gift we received from the Holy One, blessed be He. And the one who wrote about it, and also composed it for Hanukkah, is the creator and educator Hanan Ben Ari. Together with his students at the 'Adar' High School in Petah Tikva, he released the charming song "These Candles, These Children" a few years ago. I think that even without the music and singing, the words themselves are very powerful.
""These candles we light / Like the sweet children we give birth to / You can put oil in them and light the wicks / But from there it's just prayers / We raise these children / And it's a little hard to see them from the side sometimes / You have to be careful of the wind and stay alert / But from there it's patience / And we have no permission to be disappointed in them / Only to love only / And pray for a miracle, like in the old days / At this time, in this thicket / So we try inside the house to add more light / But outside the darkness becomes blacker than black / And the question marks float and rise / And confuse / And in their smile all the answers are revealed / That from above time they were already written / There is a small jar sealed with the seal of a high priest / He will not let them fall / A great light will come out of it.".
And the song ends with a prayer: "Lord of the universe, Creator of lights and man, help us understand how great and bright the candles you have given us are, and give us the strength to love them unconditionally, and to do good to them and to those who are with them, that they may stand firm against the strong winds blowing outside, that they themselves may know that each and every one of them can illuminate the world.".
