Thoughts from the ammo line

Ammo Grrrll is not taking Christmas off. In her final column of the year from hell she advises: JUST SAY THANK YOU. She writes:

I don’t know how my fellow Jews feel who frequent this site, but I feel embarrassed when our co-religionists make a big deal out of being wished “Merry Christmas.” I know who I am and I do not feel threatened or “marginalized” by an innocent wish to be included in a happy day. Sure, it can be a bit of a pain to be a minority in a majority culture, but even devout Christians bemoan the fact that Christmas has largely become a cultural, commercial holiday of gifts, cookies and family fun and there’s nothing wrong with any of that. For the devout, the religious dimension of the holiday is paramount, of course. And that’s beautiful.

Let’s break it down, shall we? You’re out for a nice December walk in Arizona, where it is 73 degrees and sunny. Because it’s Arizona! Come for the 118 in August; stay for the 80 in January! A sweet couple you don’t know wishes you a “Merry Christmas.” Now you have two choices: Option One: you can be a jerk and say, “Sorry, I’m Jewish,” which makes it sound like you are sorry THAT you are Jewish. But it also embarrasses the well-wisher needlessly, which is quite a major sin in Judaism, actually. So go with Option Two: JUST SAY THANK YOU and move on. Heck, you can even wish them a Merry Christmas back. Once, I did blurt, “Thanks, but I am Jewish,” and the well-wisher said, “So am I. I was just being neighborly.” We both laughed. There’s a lot to say for neighborliness.

An intolerant busybody masquerading as “woke” in St. Anthony, MN (a fairly well-off faculty suburb of St. Paul) famously sent letters to neighbors about their Christmas lights. She read them the riot act for making non-Christians feel bad about not being included (and I love this part) or even for those who celebrate the holiday but cannot “afford” decorations.

Here is a person whom I would not want to know for 5 minutes! Obnoxious and, it goes without saying, anonymous. I personally LOVE Christmas lights. People go to a lot of trouble and I appreciate it. It’s festive. Judaism makes a pretty big deal about bringing light into the world – and decorations are a whole lotta light. Hey, “Karen,” you obviously own a HOME – how DARE YOU live indoors when others live outdoors?

Now when the grocery packer at Byerly’s, bless her heart, bags up a whole bunch of boxed and canned items that ALL say “Kosher for Passover” on them, and she sticks in an order form for “Easter Ham,” you can at least shake your head in wonder at the cultural illiteracy involved. But there is still no need to try to embarrass the person, who was young and clueless, not mean. There is no rule that we can’t even SEE the word “Ham.” We just can’t EAT it. Heck, it was the name of one of Noah’s sons, and he was righteous enough to be chosen to build history’s worst cruise ship line.

ON THE OTHER HAND, when I was called many years ago to entertain at a “Diversity Conference” in Minnesota and it was scheduled for YOM KIPPUR, the holiest day of the Jewish Year, it seemed fine at the time to take the person’s head off. “Diversity” is their bag, not mine…you didn’t think to check a Jewish calendar? Not only do Jews not count for spit in the Diversity Pyramid, but the racist bean-counters now deem Black men to be “The White males of the Black community.” Oh yeah, this is all on a trajectory to work out just great.

Back when I was a comedian, on the road a lot, sometimes after a show a fan who was in line for an autograph would say, “I saw you last month on Carson and you were so funny!” Sadly, I was never on Carson, though I did open once for Doc Severinsen in the Twin Cities. Now once again I could have said, “I was never on Carson, you must be an idiot to have confused me with another comedian.” Yeah, that would be terrific in front of her friends. So, instead, I would just say, “THANK YOU, glad you enjoyed it, and thanks for coming tonight.”

The one time that I felt it was kind of a lie not to correct the person and denied that I had ever been on Carson, the woman INSISTED that I was mistaken. So, now, instead of just letting it go, I had embarrassed her, annoyed her, held up the line, AND made her believe I had early onset Alzheimer’s. Lord knows who she thought was me. (And thank God that I am now too old for Early Onset Alzheimer’s and will have to settle for regular old dementia.)

Finally, after one of the many, many times I had lost 20 lbs, a woman at the Chanukkah Fundraiser of the National Council of Jewish Woman came up to me and said, “Oh. My. Gawd, Susan! You’ve lost a MILLION pounds.”

And I did NOT say, “Heavens to Betsy, woman, you should be a weight guesser at the Fair! You have hit the nail right on the head. I have lost – not a hundred, not a thousand – but, exactly a million pounds, and thank God, because now I can move out of the Metrodome and back into my own home.” That is what I wanted to say. But, sometimes snark is not the best answer. So instead I just said, “THANK YOU for noticing.”

In conclusion, and carrying forward the theme of gratitude, I would like to do two more things. First, thank our wonderful commenter family for making my Fridays so special in a very bizarre and difficult year and wish every last one of you, even trolls, Merry Christmas.

And lastly, I would like to thank Still My President Donald J. Trump for promising and delivering Operation Warp Speed to produce vaccines such that any day now we can abandon masks. May the time not be distant when we say, “Let My People Go,” “Let Our Faces Show.” I miss smiling even more than restaurants. I am a very smiley person.

It goes without saying that the racist twits at the CDC have discovered that too many of the people who have taken good enough care of themselves to reach their senior years are…ARGGH… WHITE! This is totally unacceptable. So decades younger Fatties of Color will be able to budge the line ahead of us pale geezers. I missed the “severely elderly” cutoff of 75 by one year and will have to get in a prioritized line. Naturally, all politicians of any color, any age, are ahead in line, because they are just so vitally important. Never mind that their absence in a general strike, say, would not be noticed until many years after we would starve from the absence of truckers, farmers, food producers, and grocery stock boys.

As a not-quite-old-enough white lady, I expect to get my vaccination some time after the entire prison population, MS-13 gangsta illegals and their pit bulls, Hunter Biden, obese Muslim terrorists released from jail lest they get the flu, the entire NBA, the fatheads and lard-butts on The View, and all billionaires, celebrities, and their extended families who will simply bribe their way to the head of the line. Oh, well. If my 95 year old Alabaster White Daddy can survive the Commie Flu, I probably shouldn’t even get the shot at all.