December Dilemma is all about family, traditions, and holiday stories. How ever you celebrate the holidays, we would love to hear your stories and memories of celebrations past, present, and future. What are the traditions that you recognize? Send us your stories and we will post them on our site. We all have a story to tell. Let's hear yours!
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Randy Carlson - 11/09/19
One Christmas in the 60's my younger sister got a life sized - blonde-haired - freckle faced talking doll from Santa. My older sister was to pull the string on the dolls back so she would speak as my younger sister entered the room.... She entered the room and was so excited to see the doll there - the string was pulled - she spoke a sentence - the ring on the string broke off and the string went directly into the dolls back - she never uttered another word!! Needless to say my younger and older sister cried and cried. However the doll hung around for years - scaring the entire family - being so life like - appearing on sofa's and standing in the corner of a room - terrifying each of us as we entered. None of us will ever forget her! Thanks so much Santa!!
Kevin Brooks - 11/02/19
When Christmas season rolls around, in Europe or the States, Folks tend to get all bundled up, and drag out skis and skates; But in Australia's sunny clime, where kangaroos roam free, At Christmas time it's blazing hot, as any fool can see. And every year those Christmas cards would come from overseas, From Auntie Bess, and Uncle Phil, and crazy Aunt Louise; And as a child I'd stare at them, my wonderment would grow, For I had never seen this stuff, this substance known as snow! The first two verses of a poem I wrote, because I had never spent a cold Christmas until I moved to California. We would spend Christmas at the beach, eating plum pudding, with small coins mixed in. Mum and Dad are gone now, but I still cherish the memories of Christmas in Oz!
John DeKoven - 11/01/19
I am Jewish so I have always had to wrestle with this "dilemma", especially when with non Jewish women (I am now married to a Catholic). Because of this, around 4 years ago I decided to start celebrating "Festivus" which was made popular on a Seinfeld episode. I produce comedy shows and every year we have a "Festivus Jubilee" where we celebrate Festivus and have some of our favorite comedians come out to do some stand up. People can take pictures of themselves with the Festivus pole, there is the airing of the grievances where you tell your friends and family how much they've disappointed you over the year, there is a re-gifting table where you bring gifts that are so crappy you can't even re-git them, there is the Festivus fruitcake that is passed on from year to year to one lucky person who takes care of it until the next Festivus and much more. More and more people are celebrating this "holiday" as a revolt against the commercialism of he holidays. Oh and by the way that whole thing of Jews getting 8 days of presents only applies at best to children.
Jonathan I Winchell - 10/30/19
This Chanukah we were in Washington DC visiting my brother, his wife, and two kids. All together we were 20 people in my family, my sisters families and my mother. It was a wonderful simcha. For Dinner we had smoked brisket seasoned and non seasoned both very good. Than we had gefilta fish but this was done different than other years because it was like an appetiser and it was like a gelatin and it was very good. For dessert we had a cake made with matzah. Than afterwards I proposed a toast to my late father on how if he was here he would have a great time in seeing all of this happening. Cheers Dad!!
Caroline - 10/25/19
I was always jealous of my Jewish girlfriend when I was a little girl. I only
got one day of Christmas but she got eight! Then one day she told me how jealous
she was of me! It taught me to appreciate the difference and enjoy what I have.
We are still friends. Hey, Ruth! I hope you are reading this!
Upstart - 10/24/19
Each Christmas, we had a certain chair in the living room assigned to each of
us. There were three of us so there were three special chairs. We would put our
names on the chair that was assigned to us so that Santa would know which toys
to leave in which chair. On Christmas morning, we would wake up and run to our
chair. There would be all the presents we had asked for. To this day, I still
put my name on a chair and hope that Santa will find me!