A Very Pickled Christmas

Christmas is all about tradition in my family, like I assume it is in many families across the globe.  Some families attend church in celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ; some watch a marathon of Christmas-y movies; some begin to return all of the maroon and purple sweaters they received from "well-meaning" elderly relatives.

Our family had the Christmas pickle.  When I was young, after a Christmas Eve full of hearty foods to driving around and looking at the beautiful displays of Christmas lights in all the non-Jewish parts of the neighborhood, I would retire to my bed, donned in my Santa hat, preparing to wake up at 5 o'clock (at the latest).  My parents were big fans of this.

After unloading my stocking full of candies and mini-shampoos ("Thanks, Santa!"), my younger brother and I would rush down the stairs and practically throw ourselves at the Christmas tree, because hidden somewhere among the pine needles and assorted colored balls was a glass pickle that Santa had covertly placed.

Our tree.  There's a ninja pickle in the somewhere.

Whoever found the pickle first would receive the first present of Christmas, cleverly titled "The Pickle Present."  The Pickle Present was always something awesome:

And while the task may seem daunting, like finding a vegetative needle in a festive haystack, I proved surprisingly adept at locating the shiny, artificial cucumber within the conifer's prickly camouflage.  So much so that after the fifth-or-so consecutive year of finding the pickle first, I began to play it stupid, allowing my brother to come out the winner, in the spirit of Christ's magic pickle.

It wasn't much of a loss; I would use The Pickle Present just as much, only without any personal label of ownership.  This would also allow me to give my brother less for his birthday without any guilt on my conscience.

Sadly, this year is the first year since the introduction of the tradition that our family is not partaking.  This is unfortunate because the gifts were always a pleasant surprise--never anything on my Christmas list, but just as necessary... to completing my N64 game catalog.

I understand the reasoning behind it, though.  It appears that Santa has had an increasingly difficult time in finding a gift that would appease both my brother and me, depending on who could find the pickle first (me, unless I'm feeling generous).  So finally, Santa threw in the towel this year, seeing no common thread between an 18-year-old high school student whose current sole purpose is to buy his own car, and a 21-year-old writing major who would be happy getting a new box of Legos.

Personally, there was only one possibility I could think of, but Selena Gomez is hard to get a hold of these days.

"Thanks, Santa!  It's what I've always wanted!"

So, with this tradition coming to a close, I think it's getting to the point where I need to start my own traditions.  By the time I have children of my own, I can hopefully find a plastic food item to entice them into a holly-jolly version of I Spy.

Let's just hope that the practice of turning our family's prided traditions into relish doesn't become a habit.  I just know the mini-shampoos are the next to go.


UPDATE: So, I posted this Christmas Eve and by the next morning, and by the next morning I found this:

So, we got the pickle present after all.  My brother received the wonderful dice game, LCR.