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Q:
Here’s
the holiday guest list: My mother, devout Catholic, and her husband, lapsed
Catholic; my sister, who converted to Judaism and is now married to a man
who was raised as an Orthodox Jew, and my own husband, a Muslim. Between us,
we’ve got a good sampling of the three biggest religions of the world.
How can I possibly
host a “holiday party” without causing a Holy War?
A:
This is a perennially perplexing question for many Americans, and for the
Anxious Decorator, it’s enough to make a hostess spike up that eggnog with a
double dose of brandy. One of the great disadvantages to having plenty of
diversity is that it can mean a holiday clash among family and friends that
creates anything but a feeling of peace and joy.
But it doesn’t have to
be that way. Instead of focusing on what makes everyone’s celebrations
different, why not highlight the similarities?
Perhaps the best way to move forward like this, ironically, is by moving
backwards – way back to the origin of all our mid-winter celebrations, which
probably dates to pre-historic times and certainly to ancient Celtic
rituals.
The reason we have a
cluster of special days in the dead of winter is precisely because it is the
dead of winter. Even in warmer climates in the Northern Hemisphere, there is
considerably less light in December and January than the rest of the year so
it’s natural that people want to brighten things up with a little festivity
until we can start dreaming of spring.
What about using the
central theme of light as the common bond for your holiday get together?
Old-fashioned
Christmas decorations include lots of candles; in the days before those
annoying electric lights that get impossibly tangled just by sitting in a
box for 11 months, people used real candles, which of course provide a
softer, magical light. Even if you’re not terribly anxious, it isn’t hard to
see the danger in trimming an evergreen tree with lit candles, and it’s
really a wonder there isn’t a richer history of death by burning Christmas
trees in the days before Thomas Edison.
And of course it’s not
for nothing that Hanukkah is called the “Festival of Lights.” Each night of
the consecutive eight nights another candle is lit on the menorah, so that
by the last night of the festival, the menorah is ablaze with light, really
giving one the feeling that indeed, the earth is turning back toward the
light, even in the darkest nights.
There’s nothing
wrong with including some of the oldest elements of a light-filled
celebration in your party décor, and these will probably cause the least
offense to your guests. A table decorated with evergreen branches and tall
candles gives a holiday look without being too identifiably Christian. In
fact, you’d do well to skip any green-and-red color scheme, and instead burn
candles in a rainbow of colors, offsetting the Christian associations with
the evergreen. A table set with evergreen branches and blue, pink, and
yellow candles will have a much different–and more ecumenical–look.
Of course you will
use caution, and make sure the evergreen branches are far enough from the
candles so as not to light the house on fire. You can also spritz the
branches with water just before you light the candles.
What about those
twinkling little Christmas lights? Some people keep them up around the
house year-round, because they add such a festive flare. If you don’t have a
Christmas tree, you could string the lights up around the window frames of
the dining room, making a nice echo to the multi-colored candles on the
table.
A solid blue
tablecloth and green or yellow napkins will further detour your guests from
the idea that this party is for the celebration of any particular holiday.
What
about gift-giving? There’s nothing wrong with having an exchange of
gifts on this night; just make sure you let the guests know ahead of time
what the rules are. Often, especially for people who don’t know each other
well, a price limit is helpful, and make it low, like $20. You could also
encourage people to go with the theme of “things that can be used up,” which
will lead to gifts of candles, soap, motor oil, and food. These of course
have the benefit of eliminating the dilemma of what to do with that
dreadfully ugly teapot or stained-glass sun catcher or the set of coffee
mugs emblazoned with a corny saying.
Remember that the
Christian New Year is often an element in a “holiday party.” You can use
this theme to your benefit, and encourage the guests to bring their
predictions of the coming year. In fact, if you do this as an annual ritual,
you can then read the predictions from the previous year and see which ones
came true. While Jews and Muslims have other times of the calendar to mark
new years, almost all Americans recognize January 1 as the start of a new
year, if only for tax purposes. Therefore, focusing on this holiday may help
shift everyone’s eyes away from that giant dreidel on the front lawn or the
stockings you’ve hung by the chimney with care.
- Tip: For a mixed
holiday party, don’t try to mix and match the decorative symbols of
several religions. Steer clear of the usual red and green of Christmas or
blue and white of Hanukkah; instead, go for a rainbow of colors in your
candles, table settings, and linens.
Do you have a
decorating dilemma? Our Anxious Decorator is eager to put her designing mind
to work on your home problem. If you have digital photos of the problem
area, all the better! Send your questions to
anxiousdecorator@sheffield.edu.
Reprinted with permission from the Sheffield School of Design |
