Jewish wine for Christmas

Last night as we were getting ready for Rosh Hashanah dinner, we realized that our sole bottle of kosher wine had gone bad. Which was a problem. We needed kosher wine for the blessings before the meal. Fortunately, though, there’s a liquor store about a block away. I went to the store, which is run by some people whose native language is Arabic, desperately hoping that they had some wine that would solve the problem.

“Do you have any kosher wine?” I ask the young guy behind the cash register.

“Kosher? I’m not sure about that.”

I frown.

“We do have some Jewish wine,” he says.

“Okay. Can you show me where that is, please?”

“The thing is, I don’t know if it’s kosher.”

I tell him it probably is. Anyone that bothered to label a wine as Jewish would probably also make it kosher. Otherwise, why bother, really?…

The guy does his best to help, but he can’t find the “Jewish” wine quickly, and the line at the register is growing. He tells me that he has to go back to the front of the store since he’s the only one on duty tonight, but that if I wait a few minutes he’ll come back and help me find the wine I need; he’s sure that there’s something, somewhere on these shelves that’s Jewish.

While he’s ringing up the other customers, I scour the wine selection and find a lone bottle of Baron Herzog Chardonnay behind a large tag which says “Kosher” and $11.99 (I know, I know – it’s cheaper at Trader Joes, but I was willing to pay for convenience). I turn to take it to the register and meet him half way: he’s come back to help me look.

“You found something?”

“This one.” I show him the bottle..

“I sold whole cases of that yesterday,” he says. “It was crazy.”

“It’s Rosh Hashanah,” I tell him. “Jewish New Year's.”

“Oh,” he nods slowly, processing this key piece information, "that explains it."

He steps behind the counter. There’s a man ahead of me in line now, buying some wine and assorted groceries, asking for cash off his debit card. The line behind me lengthens still longer; this liquor store does brisk Saturday evening business it seems. Finally, the man’s multiple transactions are over and I’m next.

“So really, that’s kosher?” the clerk asks. “You’re sure?”

“Yeah.”

“Show me. Where does it say that?”

I point to the text on the label, that’s not only plain old kosher, but it's even kosher for Passover.

“Cool,” he says as he swipes my credit card. “That’s good to know.”

I don’t mention that there’s a big tag advertising the kosher part on the shelves of his own store.

“So, have a happy Christmas,” he says as I sign the credit card receipt.

I look up at him. “Huh?”

“Your holiday, right?” he says. “That Jewish holiday you told me about.”

“You mean New Year's,” I say.

“Oh, yeah. New Year's,” he shakes his head and shrugs. “You know I was thinking New Year's and that’s why I mixed it up with Christmas.”

I stare at him; it takes me a moment to realize he had thought the New Year's holiday I was talking about was actually in January.

“But now I realize that’s stupid,” he hands me the bottle. “And anyway Christmas is the Christian holiday," he smiles. "It even says it in the name.”

“Yeah.”

“So happy New Year,” he tells me.

And as I walk out of the store, I wonder if I should have wished him a good Ramadan in return. Or would happy Kwanza have been more appropriate?