Christmas in the Heart, Part II

It's the most frustrating thing, but kvetching about being treated like a baby just makes you feel (and appear) more and more like one. There's nothing for it. I'll just have to deal with being left out forever, but I can't talk about it or I'll be right back where I started.

On a less melodramatic, tantrum-y note, I've now had two requests that I explain Wigilia, so here we go. Wigilia is a Polish tradition. We have a big feast on Christmas Eve of traditional Polish dishes to celebrate something or other. I don't really know. All I know is that we have a big ol' traditional meal that's not traditional at all because my grandma changed a lot of the dishes because she doesn't like most of them.

According to Wikipedia, the traditional Wigilia menu includes:

Wafers

Fried carp and borscht

Boiled potatoes

Pickled herring

Pierogi

Assorted fruits, dried and regular.

But our family has:

Wafers (which you break before the meal, wishing each other happiness and good fortune. They're inadvertently delicious, maybe because at that point in the evening, we've all been to Mass and are ravenous. Wafers taste like delicious, delicious cardboard.)

Beef and barley soup (which is a major change because you're not supposed to eat red meat at Wigilia)

Cheese and sauerkraut pierogi (the cheese are much better but there are never enough. We also serve pierogi with melted butter and bread crumbs. As far as I'm concerned, that's the only way to do it. None of your "sour cream and applesauce" bullshit.)

Pickled herring (I give that a whirl once every two or three years to see if my tastes have changed. So far, they haven't. Pickled herring is nasty.)

Roast pork, asparagus and carrots, mashed potatoes

And for dessert, anise cookies. The best was the year when my Aunt Grace used aniseed extract and underestimated its power, so the cookies pretty much knocked you out with the anise flavor. It was intense. This year, the cookies were pretty mild but there was also cassata cake, which is one of the best kinds of cake in the world and also an example of the "hands across borders" deal that is my grandparents' marriage. Cassata cake is Sicilian (like my grandfather). It's basically sponge cake with liqueur and riccota cheese between the layers, with sliced toasted almonds on top. So incredibly delicious.

Around the pickled herring course, it's traditional for the younger generation to slip off and start watching "A Muppet Christmas Carol." This is a ritual in and of itself. We sing along (changing our voices when different Muppets sing), we do the Awkward Scrooge Dance, we make fun of this one really long scene that's a breakup song. It's great. I look forward to that all year.

Then, after the Muppets, my grandparents give us our Christmas presents and we have a wrapping paper war. This year's war featured my cousin Alex fashioning himself a makeshift visor out of a Watson's chocolates box and Emily and I squaring off in the center of the ring, each with equally bad aim. It gets...very heated.

The final part of the evening is one of my favorite Christmas traditions. The whole family settles down to watch "White Christmas." However, since that movie is like four hours long and it's usually pretty late by the time we even start, we only watch up till the "Snow" number. I've seen the beginning eighteen times, but I've seen the end only twice (it was on TV) and I have no idea what happens in the middle. They're in Vermont, right? There's sexual tension, right? They're doing a show or something, right?

I won't be posting about Christmas Day. The buildup is the best part, in my humble opinion.