Anneli Skaar: I see gingerbread people
It just occurred to me that I am awfully close to the time where all the lies and deceit I have been weaving for the last eight years are going to be coming to the surface very soon. This includes all the detailed ruse, willful lying, and flat-out fraud. I’ve been backing up the lies with every means at my disposal, going as far as elaborate physical disguise, theft, pulling other trusted people into my web of artifice and pretense, and straight-out entrapment.
I am, of course, talking about the myth of Santa Claus.
My son summed it up perfectly one Easter when he announced, "It's a little creepy that there is going to be a giant rabbit walking around in our house tonight while we are asleep."
You are at an age of encouraging logic and educated thinking in your children, and although you discourage contact with strangers, if it t’was the night before Christmas and said stranger is in your home helping himself to cookies and puttering around your living room while you are asleep, it’s totally cool.
With Santa magically appearing all over the place as early as November, sometimes at two or three places at once, the fact that this particular belief has lasted this long for my son is absolutely mindboggling. Santa’s mythological logistics are even more complex than most other holiday icons. The same child who questions the validity of why he can't "just poop in the shower" despite my explanation of plumbing mechanics, is the same kid who thinks it is perfectly reasonable that a 350-pound man is going to squeeze down a chimney we don't actually have.
"Well, maybe he comes through the electric radiator."
Having only one child and no other point of reference, I can only call upon my own experience. Since I can't seem to remember the exact moment I learned that my parents had been lying to me and blackmailing me for close to a decade, I can only assume it's because I have repressed it. I do remember a couple of times when I suspected the truth, but there was always an adult ready to cheerfully gaslight me at a moment’s notice.
Other parents with more than one child have the additional issue of inequality of power between the siblings in and out of the "know.” Clearly this newfound knowledge, coupled with the fresh wounds of being exposed to a cover-up, must propagate a Machiavellian mindf-ck of epic proportions in a two or three sibling household. This goes for any kind of peer group, as well.
I wonder how the inevitable reveal is going to go down in our home. Like a classic Shakespearean tale of deceit, like Macbeth? Or will it be like Bruce Willis's holy sh-t moment in the Sixth Sense? Perhaps it will it be more like a gradual discovery of smoke and mirrors like some David Lynch plot where the Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny, and Santa all go over a dark cliff with a melancholy Chris Isaak wailing on the soundtrack.
Once in a while I think I should I be looking at this differently. In this time of giving, am I looking the proverbial gift horse in the mouth? Maybe I should disregard the creepy undertones of NSA surveillance in Santa lore, stop worrying about when the lie will be discovered, and simply celebrate the Snow in Edward Snowden. I should be grateful for what it is; a peaceful way to nudge your child to do the right thing while you still can. For once during the year you are not the bad guy for setting the limits, and it is a powerful tool indeed.
When my son asks me once again, "What wall is Santa watching from," perhaps I should just answer, "All of them."
While I still can.
Anneli Skaar is a graphic designer living and working Camden who spends a significant amount of her time trying to establish a functional balance between single motherhood, career and sanity.
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