Tag: Sweden Page 3 of 6

One light at a time

On December 16, 2014

Tonight is the first night of the Jewish holiday of Chanukah. Chanukah is not one of the major Jewish holidays but because of its closeness to Christmas it has taken on much larger importance in the Jewish calander.

The holiday actually has nothing at all to do with Christmas. It celebrates an event that took place approximately 165 years before Jesus was even born. The name Chanukah comes from the hebrew verb meaning “to dedicate” and that is what the holiday commemorates: the rededication of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem after it had been desecrated by the local Greek-Syrian rulers. Jewish forces led by Judah Maccabee (Judah the hammar) revolted against these rulers and eventually won the war against them and restored the Temple. The story goes that there was only found in the Temple enough oil for the holy lamp to be lit for one day but a miracle happened and the oil lasted for 8 days, enough time to make more oil. So today we light candles for 8 days to remember the miracle of the oil. And eat oily foods like latkes and fried donuts.

But the real story, the back story, was probably not so wonderful. Judea, the Jewish kingdom that Jerusalem was the capital of, was a conquered kingdom, ruled by the Greek-Syrian Selucid Empire, the local remains of what had once been Alexander the Great’s empire. During the time when the events of the story happened the lure of the hellenic culture was very strong, even in the Jewish kingdom. The hellenized, secular Jewish faction was in conflict with the Jews who were much more consevative and felt Jews should live strict Jewish lives and not follow the Greek hellenistic way. When Antiochus Epiphanes, the Selucid Emperor, sided with the hellenized Jewish faction, the conservative Maccabees revolted and cast out him and his forces. The whole thing was in effect a civil war, Jew against Jew, with the help of some outside forces. But the religious leaders who came after the war didn’t want to commemorate and keep remembering a civil war, Jews fighting against Jews, so they came up with the miracle of the oil in the Temple and Jews once again being able to be Jews. They felt it was better to remember the positive and put aside what was evil. So to this day, when we celebrate Chanukah we celebrate by remembering the miracle of light. A much better thing to remember as I see it. And when we light the candles on our Chanukias we always add one more candle each night. Each night we add more light!

I now own 3 chanukiah, as the special 9-armed menorah is actually named. The largest is a silver and gilt one that my mother bought for me sometime after the birth of my son – for us to use as a family. The smallest one, on the right, is a gift given to me by my cousin Karel when I moved here to Stockholm so that I could remember my family back in New Jersey while I celebrated the holiday here in my new homeland. The third one, the middle-sized one in the front, is actually my newest yet my oldest. It is the one that my family lit thoughout my childhood and which I only brought back with me to Stockholm after the death of my mother three years ago. The two larger chanukiahs use the customary chanukah candles one buys in any judaica shop. The small one uses birthday candles.

Tonight, the first night, my son Bevin and I will light all three and Bevin will be given a small gift. The holiday is about the lighting of the candles and presents are not really relevant. The giving of gifts on each night of Chanukah is more a response to the gifts children get for Christmas. The more important thing is to light the candles.

In these dark days, when a member of the Swedish parlament says that Jews can never be considered real Swedes, when Islamists and Palestinians claim that the Jewish people have no right to be in Jerusalem, when synogogues are once again being burned, and Rabbis are attached, I am glad I can light my Chanukah lights together with my son, in freedom, in my home, in the land I live in. The candles remind me that Jews lived in Jerusalem over two thousand years ago, before Christianity existed, before Islam existed. Now we live in many countries. We know how to live as Swedes and as Jews. As Americans and as Jews. Being Jewish is a plus situation. It isn’t an either/or proposition. We can be both a true citizen of the country we live in and a Jew at the same time. We know how to integrate without losing our identity. We have been doing it for over 2 thousand years. In this cross-cultural world we live in, this is something we can teach the world.

Summertime

By Hilarie

On July 8, 2013

In Life, Stavsnäs

I took a walk this morning – down the road to the postboxes to pick up our morning newspaper. It was a pleasant, sunny 18 degrees C but the very brisk north wind made if feel cooler. On my way back to the house I took a short detour down to the lake. It was still early so there was no one there – I had the whole beach to myself. I waded out into the water, to just above my knees and stood there watching the fish swimming around my feet.

I like standing there in the chilly water. It makes my arthritic joints feel better. Small wind-driven wavelets lapped about my knees and I listened to the tree leaves rustling in the breeze, in waves of sound, punctuated by the cries of the various bird species that live here in our neck of the woods. This is summer. This is what vacation means to me. I stayed there for quite awhile.

Sometimes as we drive to the store from our house, we pass joggers. There they are, running along our country road with their ears stuffed with earplugs attached to their smart phones. I have no idea what they are listening to. Aside from being mildly dangerous – they can’t hear cars coming from behind them – I can not understand why they would choose to cut themselves off from the all the sounds of Nature around them. I can’t imagine how anything coming over the wire could possibly beat that.

I was never much of a nature-lover back in my previous life, back in New York City. And even when I first moved to Stockholm, I preferred the city to the country. But now I can sit back, on my deck, listening to the birds and the sounds the trees make in the breeze and just feel good. I like looking at the green color of the trees as they are silhouetted against the bright blue Swedish sky and think what a beautiful color combination that is. Whoever designed that combination should be very proud of themselves. Professor Buckley, the color teacher at Pratt, certainly would think so.

Bad news

By Hilarie

On December 14, 2011

In Family, Life, Uncategorized

Tuesday evening, December 13th
I’m slouching on a sofa with my legs stretched across a coffee table in the lounge off to the side of the entrance to the dining hall. In front of me is a large fireplace. It’s just a gas fire but I like the feel of the heat on my face and to watch the flicker of the flames. I almost doze off in between listening to the sounds of the voices of the residents as they leave the dining room. New York accents, Brooklyn accents, New Jersey accents, all mix and blend together with the occaisional Yiddish word thrown in for local color. The most common question of the evening is about “The Races”. “Are you going to the races?” “Races?” “Races!” “Yeh, in the auditorium!” “Now?” “No later!” “Upstairs!” “Are you going?” “I dont know, Im tired.” “You should go!” “Are YOU going?” And on and on.

I overhear a small group discussing my mother. They mention Evelyn’s daughter, the one from Sweden. They discuss Marty, my mother’s friend. A man sits down at the piano behind me and starts to play for a bit. Another group gets on the elevator. A voice calls out “floors please, tell me your floors please.” (there are only 2 floors) An elevator voice calls out “the Rainbow Room, take me to the Rainbow Room”. The elevator is filled with laughter as the doors close.

I’m tired. Its only 7 o’clock but I’m tired. Its been a tough day. As usual, I woke very early – after going to sleep late after a long conversation with an old friend. At 8 o’clock I go to the cafe for my complementary breakfast. A resident comes up to me and says ” You know Martin Wendruff, right?” Now, Marty has been my mom’s fella practically since she moved in here 4 years ago. I had just seen him the evening before, when he had come back from a short stay in the hospital. He was in a room in Health Care, the same section of Monroe Village that my mom lives in. I answer, Yes, to the man in the cafe and he asks me if I had heard the news about Marty. Thinking he was referring to the fact that Marty had just moved into Health Care, I ask if that is what he is referring to. The man in the cafe, Sandy, says, “No. Marty died last night.” I stand there in shock! I can’t take it in. I had just seen him the evening before. Sandy says that Marty’s daughter was over in the computer room. I had met her for the first time the evening before. I head for the computer room – my bag of stuff forgotten on the floor under the table, my handbag forgotten on the floor, my breakfast forgotten. I see Linda and we go back to the cafe and talk over a cup of coffee. She leaves, to continue with all the preparations she has to do. I start to eat my breakfast but my buttered toast now seems to be just dry bread in my mouth.

My sixth day here in Monroe Village has begun.

A good man

By Hilarie

On October 7, 2011

In Autobiographical, Family, Life, Uncategorized

October 15 is the yahrtzeit or anniversary of my father’s death. He died in 1997. My mother called me here in Sweden a few days before, to tell me that the doctors had said there was nothing more they could do for him and she had decided to unhook him from the machines he was attached to. My husband booked me on a flight to the States the next day. Mom picked me up at Newark airport and we drove directly to the hospital. I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening sitting there next to my dad, holding his hand. I don’t know if he knew if I was there or not, but I like to think he had been waiting till I came. That night, sometime around midnight or so, the hospital called to say my dad, Milton Cutler, had peacefully passed away.

me and my dad

While my mom kept herself busy making funeral arrangements, I sat down at her computer and wrote a eulogy for my father. I thought those words had been lost long ago on some old hard disk. Recently, while I was helping my mom move, I found a printed copy of the eulogy and brought it home with me to Stockholm. Now on the anniversary of his death 14 years ago I want to give that eulogy once again. Here it is.

My father was not the kind of man who created a stir when he entered a room. He was a little man, almost petite, and spoke softly. He wasn’t the kind of person who could tell riveting stories or captivate an audience. But I remember when I was little, he used to read to me before I went to sleep. He didn’t read to me ordinary run-of-the-mill bedtime stories. He read me Kon Tiki by Thor Heyerdahl and Aku Aku, the book about the statues on Easter Island. He liked those kind of stories and that was what he found interesting to read to me. For my tenth birthday I received a subscription to National Geographic from him and long after I moved away from home, the issues kept coming every month to the house, with my name on them, but not really for me.

He also loved Science Fiction and that love I’ve inherited. I read my first Sci Fi book when I was 11 – The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury, it was Daddy’s book. After that I read every Sci Fi book Daddy had till I started to buy my own.

He was a quiet man who rarely voiced his own opinions or demanded to have things his way. I think he came from a generation for whom the expression “self-fulfillment” would cause a feeling of discomfort and the idea of “doing your own thing” was an alien concept. For him, it was more important, to do the right thing. He didn’t drink, he didn’t gamble, he didn’t chase after women. His life wasn’t easy but he stuck with it. He worked hard and tried to give the people he loved in his life as much as he was able to. And when his time came, there wasn’t much time left to do the things he had wanted to do.

My father was one of those small, inconsequential men that the world out there doesn’t take much notice of. But he was a good man and in this day and age, just simply being a good man is something worthy of our respect, deserving of our praise and should be cherished in our memories.