sweaty wafers

It used to be a Christmas Eve tradition in my husband’s massive Irish Catholic family. Before eating dinner on the night before Christmas, we would pray, and then these thin, tasteless wafers would get passed around to everyone. Literally everyone. If you could hold something in your hand, you got a piece of the wafer stack. I’d have to guess there was at one point close to 50 people in his Gram’s downstairs. It was crowded. And most of the guys were holiday sweater sweaty. But it didn’t matter. This was tradition. And this was family.

Wafer in hand, you would walk up to your first family member. They’d break a tiny piece off your wafer, and you’d break a piece off theirs and say, “Merry Christmas” and give a hug and kiss on the cheek. Apologies would follow if you accidentally broke off too big of a wafer piece, since that meant they’d have to ration their wafer for the remaining hoard of family members. Sometimes, if you were at the end of the wafer sharing, you got a crumb…. or a moist piece that lost its crunchiness thanks to hand sweat. That was never fun.

You’d weave through the crowd of people to get to the next one. Ensuring that by the end of it, you shared your wafer with all the humans whole gathered under that roof that night. Each person had their own methods of checking the 40 or so people off their list of during their own personal Wafer Sharing expedition. Most would start at the beginning of his Gram’s 9* children, sharing their wafer with the oldest and their family, and working down from the there. I can’t tell you how many times I saw people holding out their hands as they walked around wafer sharing. Counting each child and saying “Bo, Terri, Brian, Deanne….”ticking off each to be sure no one was missed.

I didn’t have that method in the beginning because I was coming into this tradition as an outsider. Back in the golden ages when I was 16, I just made my way around haphazardly. Walking up to each aunt, uncle, or cousin saying, “Did I get you yet?” This was a great way to get to know each and every family member. To imprint on your mind the names, relationships, and faces. There were so many blue-eyed people. How do I tell them apart?!

But some stuck out quickly. Like Uncle Frank. Who during one of my first Christmas Eve Wafer Sharing’s with them, teased me by calling me by Vince’s ex-girlfriend’s name. Reallllll nice, Frank. Yes, I still remember that. It’s been almost a quarter of a century, but some things just stick. 

I Want This

Teasing aside, coming from my childhood and utter lack of traditions OR family, I was mesmerized by the Wafer Sharing. It’s truly a culture shock to see how other people’s lives can be so different from yours. While I had love in pockets growing up, this was entirely new. There was love EVERYWHERE in this small house filled with soooo many people. Through this Wafer Sharing event, I saw each person hug, smile, and share love through the shared tradition they all had. 

I didn’t realize this at the time. But seeing this event each Christmas Eve shaped how I am raising my kids. Seeing this tradition made me love traditions. It made me love creating memorable moments for my family that they will hopefully someday carry on with their kids. This event just struck a chord in my heart that I knew I wanted to build on.

Sadly, this wafer sharing tradition ended years ago. His Gram went to heaven too early, and then these wafers couldn’t be found I believe since we did continue to gather as a family after she left us. I think she used to get them from the church and at some point, the church stopped selling them. Regardless, while Christmas Eve dinners still happened, the Wafer Sharing ended.

Then, we moved away from my husband’s large family to escape the Pennsylvania dreariness and cold. I miss everyone. Every face and name I now know. We’ve made our own traditions as a small family though. And our house is filled with love and plenty of teasing. Our Christmas Eves are now warm, but not from the combined body heat of 48 people in 3 rooms.

Still, every Christmas Eve, I would think about the wafers….

This year, I was thinking about the wafers again as usual, and a thought popped into my head, “why don’t I search for them online? These have to be sold SOMEWHERE.”

The Internet for the Win

And I was right!

They are called Oplatek and are a Christmas tradition that originated in Poland. These wafers symbolize the unity of the family and in sharing the Oplatek, you are sharing all that is good with life. In the Polish tradition, missing someone during your wafer sharing is actually a really bad thing. You should make sure not to miss anyone because they believe it means terrible misfortune or even death in the following year. Geez, maybe I should have done the mental countdown of the 9* kids. Sorry if I ever missed anyone and it caused you to have a shitty year.

This Christmas Wafer tradition, one that I thought was just his family’s, turns out to be one that is centuries old. I don’t know when the sharing of Oplatek started for his family. What the history looks like. But I know it was an important event for me. One that had a lasting impact. Having now found them after many years of not having this Christmas Eve tradition, I know what my family will be doing for many Christmases to come.