Dear Santa,
Pleas give the homles extra
toys this year. Oh and I
realy want tecno zoidsfrom
Kyle (age eight)
I thought I was so funny as a kid, or maybe I was just humoring my little sister (who would have been 5). Do you remember the whole “Do YOU believe in Santa?” debate of childhood? “Well MY daddy says he’s real!” I remember. As a kid, I was skeptical of the whole Santa theory from the start. Flying Reindeer? They didn’t even have wings. Now if his sleigh was pulled by eight pegasus, his case might hold water. I had demanded the truth from my parents at five.
I set a trap for Santa at age three, and caught my dad setting up the train around midnight. Of course he sent me to bed, saying Santa was coming soon. Do you remember Teddy Ruxpin?
He was a bear that talked, the Furby of his day. I got one when I was 2. The first thing I did was turn him upside down to figure out how he worked. I wasn’t to be fooled by all the grown-ups.
“I mean come on Grandma, I wipe my own ass, how dumb do you think I am?”*
Question for the readers: How and how old were you when you found out there was no Santa Clause?
*Not an actual quote from Kyle, age 2.
The striking similarities never cease to amaze me. I think I was somewhere between 7 and 10. The handwriting was the same and the presents consisted merely of the things I hadn’t yet already discovered. It was the same thought as well - duh, seriously? Along with all the other portrayals of “magic” in the world, it was merely a clever facade for entertainment. But I didn’t mind… I had presents, dammit. Mine, all mine!
Wasn’t until a few years later I understood that that the things I “learned” about on Sunday mornings fell under the same umbrella
I do remember Teddy Ruxpin! I wanted one so bad. My “rich” cousin got one and I didn’t. (My Mormon parents got busy having eleven children instead of finishing college. Anyone who lived in a house with finished flooring was “rich” in my mind.)
My parents didn’t do the Santa thing. Not enough time I guess. I don’t think I believed in Santa until I went to school and heard about him from other kids. I woke up Christmas morning when I was six and went to look at the tree to see what was different from the night before (because that would have been what Santa did), but nothing was different. I don’t remember believing again after that.