I don't remember my parents really hitting the Santa thing that hard. Oh, I had "Breakfast with Santa" when I was three, but it's not like we wrote letters or got our picture taken with him every year. In fact, I don't remember my younger sister ever seeing Santa. But I could be wrong.
I was a child for whom the line between reality and fantasy was a bit blurred. Correction: I was a child for whom the line between reality and fantasy was non-existent. I vividly remember during a large family meal at The Sizzler with all the relatives-you know, one side was a booth bench, the other side were chairs and all the little tables were connected together with those leaf things (why is called a "leaf" anyway?). I stood up in my seat, turned around and did the Nestea plunge directly backward into to table .The table connector leaf things broke apart and I was in the floor showered with Texas Toast, Iced Tea and Sweet&Low packets. I was completely bewildered by the outcome. In my mind, I guess I had gone to my "happy place"- where I spent much of my time while in the company of my mothers family, and just forgot where I was.
Needless to say, I was a daydreamer. I wasn't really taught there was a Santa, I HOPED there was a Santa, I prayed there was a Santa. There had to be real magic somewhere in the world. There had to be more to life than what I was observing life to be. Maybe Santa wasn't real for anyone else in the world, but I pleaded with God to make him real for me. I was so angry the Christmas morning I woke up earlier than anyone in my family and looked at the tags on the presents marked "From Santa" and realized that it was my mothers handwriting. Something in me broke. And there was a bitterness and a resentment I had toward my mother that took root in that moment. Like I blamed HER that Santa was a scam, designed by parents to manipulate their children in to behaving a few weeks out of the year.
There are heartbreaks in this life that you can't shield your children from. I guess I felt like this was one that I could. And, selfishly, I didn't want to be resented by my kids the same way I resented my mother.
I asked my daughter if she felt cheated that we didn't play up the Santa thing. She said no, and she felt sorry for the kids in her class who still believe in Santa. Someone in the store had asked my son, who was then five, what Santa was bringing him for Christmas. He said very matter-of-factly "I don't like Santa Claus". He saw A Christmas Story and Santa has freaked him out ever since (Ho Ho HOOOOOOO).
So, every December, I put on 10 lbs trying to fill the empty hole that "Christmas Magic" used to fill with fudge, peppermint hot chocolate, and an abundance of pork products.
I now sit at my post-reflection crossroads- should I hit the elliptical, or eat some cookie dough?
