Christmasilence

My favorite sounds during the holiday season, beyond the endless, dance like Dopey hit parade of Christmas music, which I mass consume like I’m listening to radio station WCOSTCO are not what you would expect.

As we slowly begin our approach towards landing on the tarmac of December 25th, as trays are put in their upright position and we make sure that our seat belts are buckled, I find that the everyday symphonic cacophony of the outside world slowly begins to dissolve like fallen angel snowflakes on a toasty pane of window glass, and all the sounds of the earth evaporate like magic and replaced by the new kid in town:

The Sounds of Silence.

Being that my last name is Simon, the duet that begins is performed by Simon and.

It’s like the outside world suddenly becomes this blank, sometimes white snow canvas and I am the artist who gets to decide which sonic color I feel like painting with.

And what a joyful palette I have.

Driving this morning, bound for my disappearing act corner table here at Antoinette’s Coffee Shop in the river town of Hastings-On-Hudson, I found myself composing an oratorio for defroster and radio which became, in an instant, the soundtrack for the traveling memory show that erupted from the movie studio of my brain with the heart swollen rapture of a flock of just-released doves bound for the furthest reaches of that pure and wide open frontier that we call the past.

The past has its own specific sound during these holiday days.

During the rest of the year the sounds of yesterday and so far away get muted by grown-up heartache or stampeded over by the cattle of unexpected events which more often than not leaves me lost and stagger wandering, like the famous picture of that naked, just Napalmed, arm-stretched, Vietnamese Girl of long ago.

Most of my average worker-bee year is spent dodging stray bullets as pieces of my dreams begin to shatter into a million pieces like a candy bar of just cracked Turkish taffy, but sometime around Thanksgiving the reverse process begins and those puzzle-like pieces fly into reverse, gravitationally, and just like that, the band has gotten back together, everything makes perfect sense and my the chemistry of my blood is made up of pure 100% USDA optimism.

We become, in an instant, our own better angels, wings sprout involuntarily and flight becomes not only reasonable but essential,

Birthdays only last one brief day, which gives us no choice but to cram our entire life history into a blur of inconsequential inventory, which pretty much acts as a distraction from the hardcore reality fact that we are all marching steadily towards the tick-tock Bat-an march of Finality, U.S.A.

But during those days between Thanksgiving all the way to New Years, time becomes as elongated as Mr. Fantastic, an hour seems to outlast forever and little by little we start to become daffy and dreamy, aided by a steady diet of sweets and fantasies which are released into with all the unbridled joy of a Jules Feiffer ballerina’s dance to Spring.

I have written at length about how we Jews are a significant part of the Christmas soundtrack, given that virtually every single holiday song was written by members of my tribe, from Rudolph The Red Nose Reindeer to White Christmas. The feeling of inclusion is a bit or a mirage however and in fact can make me feel like we’re another form of minstrel show, where we gleefully entertain you at the expense of our own dignity and right after the show, we get shuttled right out the back door of the kitchen, where we are thrown into the back of van and shipped right back to the Shtetl.

Given that most of our lives are nothing more than the forever mutating, unconsciously made-up stories and self-protecting lies that we author in order to feel justified or at the very least, alive, it’s no great stretch for guys like me, to keep panning for significance during these mostly Christian days, until for a few brief, shining moments I feel like I’ve struck gold.

Sure, we have Chanukah, but that is nothing more than Christmas light. It’s really just us trying to find the residue of glitter on the meatless bone.

Instead of feeling like the outsider that we Jews usually feel like, I dive right into the holiday spirit and keep floating in the think tank of me, until I reach a state of legalized bliss.

Which brings me back to the sounds that comfort me during this time. I no particular order:

I love the aforementioned sound of the cranked up fanboy car defroster in concert with a creaky full of crooning ghosts, traditional holiday station, especially when it is snowing.

Defroster the snowman emits just the right amount of zen-quality white noise, while the weather outside is the classic silent movie, “Flurry of the East.” Wait: is that Mary Pickford floating by helplessly on that block of river driven ice?

I love the sound of tires on a winter crunchy road.

I love the soft background conspiracy murmur of NPR, which makes me feel like I have company who I don’t have to give cake and coffee to.

I love the sound of distant traffic which flows like HOV Atlantic ocean tide.

I love the snap, crackle, pop of a fireplace, which for now, is an app which simulates the real thing and yet, I could swear that I can feel its emitted heat. I used to joke that if I wanted a Yule log, I could just burn the soundtrack album of The King and I.

I love the cattle thumping of upstairs neighbor kids in socks running up and down stairs.

I love the sound of every conceivable kind of Christmas music, played at low, lullaby levels, which usually renders me, post-Titos and limes, couched and comatose, nursery swaddled in a fake fur Pottery Barn blanket which makes me feel like I am being hugged by my imaginary dog, Kevin.

I love the sound of fresh bed linen as I go duvet diving.

I love the sound of sink and shower water, whooshing through the faucet, beckoning me to shave or skinny dip.

I love the pipe clanging sound of the heat kicking in, which arrives like the cavalry, which used to be our once upon a time rescuing and endlessly supportive parents.

And most of all I love the sounds that I have banked of every woman who ever said, “I love you too.”

Sadly, by around January 2nd or so, we will break the holiday sound barrier and return to that just-get-me-through-the-day place where most of us hear nothing more than the frantic distress signal that is sent from the most primitive neighborhood of our brains the second that we are overwhelmed by that Titanic-sized sinking feeling.

But until then, do you hear what I hear?