The Holiday Spirit at Wakefield

The time between Thanksgiving and Christmas is one of my favorite times of the year and one during which I feel particularly grateful to work at Wakefield School. I like the “holiday season” because it is generally happy time of year during which we take time to spend with our friends and family and celebrate our many blessings. I look forward to selecting a thoughtful gift for a friend or family member and to having my house filled with the smell and sounds of holiday cheer. Planning menus, baking treats, and wrapping presents by the fire all seem like delightful ways to spend a weekend afternoon in December to me. This year I find myself looking particularly forward to Christmas morning because my son will be old enough, I hope, to get fully into some of the frenzy and excitement of opening gifts. Creating a magical experience for him is of paramount importance to me, as is having our family around us as a new generation learns about the Christmas spirit.

You may be wondering what this has to do with Wakefield and why I am particularly grateful for Wakefield during the holidays. In our current state of hyper political correctness I often find myself walking on egg shells this time of year and asking myself, “is it okay to say Merry Christmas or do I have to say Happy Holidays” or “oh, no did I just wish my Jewish friend a Merry Christmas, is he going to be offended?”. Being politically correct, I believe, started out as a valiant effort to be aware of and sensitive to the diverse nature of our communities and country but I don’t think the purpose was to cleanse us of our spirit and enthusiasm for our beliefs and traditions. Wakefield has navigated this sometimes confusing and sensitive path with grace and respect for all traditions without cleansing the school of holiday spirit and enthusiasm. Our teachers are able to decorate Christmas trees, explain the menorah and teach the dreidel song to their classes, they can watch Rudolph or sing Christmas carols, they can talk about the traditions of kwanza and wish one another a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah, or Happy Kwanza without fear of offending someone because it is okay to share your spirit and custom with someone else, even if it is not theirs. Wishing a non-Jewish person a Happy Hanukah is not disrespectful of their faith, it is a celebration of your faith.

Our community was able to find its way to this happy point by taking an approach of being inclusive rather than being desensitized. We celebrate all the holidays rather than none of them. I realized how special this was when I was showing the campus to a prospective student a week or so ago and he was amazed that we had paintings of Christmas trees and menorahs in our hallway – he said at their school they are only allowed to cut out snowflakes! Our inclusive and celebratory approach does leave us vulnerable to unintentionally offend someone but we are a place at which students and teachers are learning, and teaching, academic lessons as well as lessons about life. What better lesson can we teach our children than to be inclusive and respectful of one another’s beliefs and traditions by exposing them to as many customs as possible? Yes, sometimes we have to say we are sorry, but isn’t that real life, learning to say I am sorry and coming out a more informed person in the end?

So, as I look forward to our assembly on Friday at which we will carol and read poems I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Enjoy this happy season with your friends and family! We hope to see you at our Open House on Jan. 17 at 9 am.

Sarah