Was looking out the kitchen window just now, and outside saw one of the kids across the way, looking through a bag for something. What Xmas goodies would be hiding outside in below-freezing weather, I'm not sure, but I was convinced it must be just that, something holiday related --what else would he be doing this afternoon? From this distance I couldn't make out what he finally grabbed, but perhaps it was only a soda or sweet-treat (hey, they have their laundry and dryer outside, why not save on refrigerator space?). Still most likely what he and his family, like a lot, if not most, people on this block, in this city, across the country, and many other parts of the world, are doing right now--celebrating Xmas.
Leaving aside the meaning, practice, and politics of the holiday itself for the moment, it shares with other such days or events a reflected ubiquity: part of what makes occasions like these transcend the norm is some kind of self-identification with a prevailing tide. Of course, this is just an extremely amplified quotidian condition. (You might say that in a city, especially like NY, this everyday experience is generally more amplified than the rest of the world. Riding the subway at certain times of certain days allows quite a bit of certainty about where people are going or what they're doing--going home, "out," to work, to school, to a game, or, especially this time of year, shopping--and a bond can be formed around it. But, then again, NY, as much as or more than any other place, has such a diversity of peoples and cultures, that at any given time there are more divergent streams of human activity to temper whatever calendrical monolith might be at hand--disasters, natural and otherwise notwithstanding. Indeed, this is one of the many things I love about NY. So it is true, at this moment, that any place outside the city in any direction has a probably greater homogeneity of holiday than does my charming Bushwick block. That said...)
(disclaimer: no he doesn't)This above-average unanimity can be both beautiful and terrifying. Most migratory birds having already fled south, their stationary brethren remain: pigeons still share the fluid simplicity of their group-think flight, even in the most casual and daring aerial acrobatics, that we, begrudgingly perhaps, admire from our earth-bound in(if you consider that we on the ground move as individuals more easily)dependence, and are left with our self-identities intact. If hesitant with appreciation, perhaps it's only the formality of their movement that can't help remind us of the lock-step of jack-boots, from the twentieth century and of today. Although China's displays of mass-maneuvering now titillate for those with Olympic fervor, their neighbors to the east prepare for thermonuclear Armageddon with similarly militaristic moves, and dressed not too dissimilar to boot.
NY in a way gets a special dispensation for being especially Xmas-y, despite our low-density celebration, and yet not in spite of but for our dour and multicultural norm--everybody's rooting for us (of course, Hollywood and literature haven't hurt). In a similar fashion, the city has now become sacred ground for those who, before almost a decade ago, would've have rejoiced if Manhattan ever wound up underwater (ironically, if puzzlingly, many of the newly devout still would). The same could be said though of most I've known, including those who were there, who now morn the loss of the towers, despite their own unique aesthetic and economic villainy they maintained while standing.
For all my resident lonely-Jew-on-Xmas status, I've had a handful/fair share of uniform Christmastime. But, today, like many, I'm the outsider looking in. Only, and here's why it's actually really hard to ever be completely alone--no matter the feeling or lack of corporal or even digital proof--there are plenty of other people similarly, for want of or for wont, passing the day like any other Saturday and yet are singularly aware of narrow focus of so many around, if for no other reason than it's a little more quiet around than usual. But, like in front of some window display, standing in the cold, there is a warmth, actually and emotionally, to be felt in a group.
