To put it bluntly, you are loathed at the Seder table. Yes, during the other 364 days of the year you are cherished, respected, and tolerated for smelling more like a cedar closet than you once did. You represent happy childhoods to your children, give gifts and tell great stories to their children, and are forgiven for having teeth the same color as Dijon mustard.
But then, in the time it takes to say, “After forty years in the desert, Moses’s breath could melt a pyramid,” all that unbridled affection unravels because of your insistence that we read every single Hebrew word of an already-long service that stands in the way of partaking in the festive meal. The irony being that these prolonged prayers cannot even be heard above the growling stomachs of the people seated at the table. Hungry adults who have worked all day and battled traffic on their commutes home. Hungry children who’ve spent the entire day at school and are looking forward to singing “Dayenu” and then stuffing their faces before pillaging the house in search of the afikomen with their cousins. Even hungry pets are eager to forgo the ho-hum blandness of store-bought food in favor of a delicacy like a discarded shank bone.
Is it any wonder that, according to polls conducted by the Federation of Rabbinical Theologians (FART),1 the Most Despised People in the Jewish Community List looks like this?
1. Adolf Hitler
2. Osama bin Laden
3. Grandparents at Seders
4. ISIS
Exactly what should be done to stem the mounting tide of disdain and preserve the legacy of this greatest generation? The Federation of Rabbinical Theologians, in conjunction with the recently formed League of United Divine Learned Youth (FARTLOUDLY), maintains that the ball is in the grandparents’ court. Your choices are threefold: you can keep your mouths shut and adhere to the wishes of offspring whose turn it is to run their own Seders as they see fit; you can not show up to the Seders until after the meal, when the door is opened and you are dressed as Elijah, which will provide a good laugh for adoring grandchildren, especially if you give them money after their laughs subside; or you can convert to a religion that doesn’t eat. The choice is yours.