By Joshua Bernstein

CHRISTMAS, TO ME, MEANS TWO THINGS:
movies and Chinese food. But for the masses in early-90s Dayton, OH, birthplace of flight, Dear Abby and blown elections, munching moo goo gai pan and gawking at flame-filled, Bruckheimer car explosions was hardly holiday tradition.

Second-generation New York City Jews in Midwestern exile, my parents insulated me from suburban Christianity. While nothing short of blinding me with a menorah would block my cul de sac's "ho, ho, hoing" rooftop Santas and strands of epilepsy-inducing red-green lights, psychology was a stand-in blindfold.

"The mall Santa hates Jews," my dad said one year, when I begged for a five-dollar Polaroid photo-op.

"Please?" I said, unable to understand how anti-Semitism could happen next to a JCPenney.

"No, because then we'll have to circumcise you again. You don't want to be circumcised again, do you? Do you?"

Another bloody snip was low on my wish list, but other items were not. Like a new GameBoy. Or shoes unsullied by my cat's trick bladder. Instead, as youthful Daytonians spent December 25 cosseted by presents, parental love and candy canes, I was treated to lo mein and equally greasy Hollywood blockbusters.

As years snowballed and I moved on to Brooklyn's Hebe-friendly environs, I understood my Christmas agenda was Jew m.o.: Goy clans gathered 'round the yule log while my tribe sat in cracked-vinyl booths, slurping egg drop soup and fighting over fortune cookies.

Why not? As traditions go, it makes as much sense as a bunny hiding day-glow eggs to commemorate Christ's Return of the Living Dead shtick. Or a pre-cardiac-arrest Jerry Garcia look-alike riding reindeer deep into a starry night. That's not a holiday; it's a hallucinogenic trip.

Then my aunt invited me to New Jersey.

My mother was raised Catholic. Sparing me religious bewilderment, she converted to Judaism. But her sister, Denise, and father, Danny, manned the Christ fort. The moat was being drained.

"Come on, it'll be fun. We'll eat lasagna," my aunt said.

"Lasagna?"

"Oh, it's a Christmas tradition. But you wouldn't know about that, would you?"

"No," I said, wanting to add, but I'm a goddamn General Tso encyclopedia.

"You should come out to Jerseeee," she said, like the state was a t-shirt worn by overweight sports nuts, a slight exaggeration.

I weighed options. That year, friends were spending Christmas in fly-over states. I stuck behind, preferring to drink my holiday cheer in East Village dives. One night, I met a woman named Nora who whisked me to Washington Square Park to buy dirt-grade marijuana. Instead, she purchased a near-mugging by several men with kielbasa-thick dreadlocks. I barely escaped, stumbling home to fall asleep in my cold, quiet Queens bedroom.

"Sure, sure, I'll come to Jersey," I said.

"Great!" my aunt bubbled. "We'll see you Christmas Eve. Oh, and don't forget gifts."

What do you buy a 76-year-old grandfather whose conversational repertoire consists of "Hello?" "Un-huh" and "Please turn on wrestling"?

Grandpa Danny was a quiet man, a rule-by-the-belt type who never learned to drive or, consequently, left the East Coast. When our paths crossed, conversations were brief, and centered on blond-tressed wrestler Hulk Hogan.

"That Iron Sheik is going to get his," Grandpa would say. "Body slam him, Hulk. Body. Slam. Him. What'd you say, Josh?"

"Go…Hulk?"

"Go Hulk!"

At the time, I was pizza-diet poor. Temp paychecks scantily covered rent for me and my cockroaches. So I bought a mauve dollar-store sweatshirt, which I adorned with iron-on letters: FOXY WRESTLING GRANDPA.

My aunt was easier.

"I love candles. Anything with candles. The more candles the better," she said.

Okay, candles. But what about dogs? Aunt Denise was a bank manager in her early 40s. She married, then divorced and, instead of kids, kept dachshunds. Three, named Buddy, Samson and, in honor of The Little Rascals, the black one was dubbed Buckwheat.

I played it simple, buying seasonally appropriate God candles, which I festooned with pictures of myself and handwritten screeds declaring WORLD'S GREATEST NEPHEW.

Hello, Jersey.

I arrived Christmas Eve at my aunt's suburban ranch home around dinner time. Greeting me was an unexpected guest: Duke, a Marlboro man in spirit and cigarette. Duke wore a cowboy hat and two-day facial hair. He spoke with John Wayne syntax.

"Just got out of jail a bit ago," Duke drawled by way of introduction. "I'm your aunt's friend. I'm stayin' here and tryin' to get back on my feet."

I didn't know whether to hand him quarters or call his parole officer. Instead, I questioned his crime.

"Oh," he said, reaching into his pocket for a Marlboro. "I killed a man in self-defense."

Details were blurry, but it seemed Duke's daughter dated a character with a penchant for shiny knives. He threatened to introduce the knives to Duke's stomach. Duke had a .45-caliber rebuttal.

"Well, Merry Christmas," I said, setting my gifts beneath the fake white Christmas tree and hunting for the liquor cabinet.

"It'll take the edge off," Aunt Denise said, pouring me a plastic cup of white wine.

I sipped and took a seat at a table covered with scented candles. Sniffing me, her dachshund trio started circling my chair, yipping like movie Indians.

"Buckwheat! Samson! Buddy! Be nice," she said, turning to me. "Oh, they don't mean any harm. They're just excited to see a handsome young man." She pinched my cheeks. I sipped wine. And approached Grandpa.

He was on the couch, watching greasy men in spandex fling each other around a ring.

"Hey, Grandpa, how's it going?" I asked, seeing the man for the first time in a year.

"Fine," he said, "just watching some wrestling. Hulk's on tv."

I sat next to Grandpa and gulped wine, watching muscle-bound men grunt, waiting for my aunt's vocal dinner bell: "Merry Christmas, everyone; lasagna's on!"

Grandpa, Duke, Aunt Denise and I gathered around a table and dug into a dinner of iceberg lettuce and sausage-studded lasagna.

"Pass the ranch dressing," was the last word said that meal.

Dinner was a silent, 50s-style affair, when children should be seen and not heard. I shoveled several portions into my maw and excused myself to sleep. It was 8 p.m.

I awoke early Christmas morning to find Duke, Grandpa and Aunt Denise sitting around the tree in pajamas, expectant.

"Come on, sleepy pants, open your presents," my aunt said, beckoning to a shiny, three-tiered pile topped by a JOSH sign.

I shushed down the stairs and sat down.

"This your first Christmas?" Duke asked.

"Uhh, yeah. I'm Jewish."

"Santa doesn't discriminate. Let's see what he got you."

I opened my first gift and found a discount-coupon book.

"There are so many deals," my aunt said, snatching the book. "Look: buy one Big Mac, get one free. That's amazing!"

I agreed, and unwrapped my second present, removing tissue paper to reveal a cigarette-branded watch.

"My Marlboro miles got that for you," Duke said, beaming.

I slipped the watch onto my wrist and moved onto my final gift: a mushy hunk that looked like dirty laundry. Its insides exposed a t-shirt adorned with a man in Speedos flexing.

"That's the Rock," Grandpa said, adding, "He's a wrestler."

My Christmas clan gathered around, clutching their presents. The dachshunds sat quietly nearby on their hind legs. I slipped the t-shirt over my head, flashed the Marlboro watch and, with lo mein squirming through my head, said, "Go Rock."