Childhood Trauma

One of my childhood hurdles occurred when I discovered from my best friend Kathy that there was no Santa Claus. I took it upon myself to deliver the news to my mother, whom I was sure, based on her convincing acting job that she, too was operating under the delusion that Santa Claus still existed. After I had been put to bed, I waited 15 minutes and then heart racing, went downstairs to interrupt my mother during her "Adult Time", which was spent reading with a glass of sherry and maybe a cigarette. I delivered the news after which I fully expected her to fall apart in shattered desolation. Instead, she said, "That's right! Now you can help decorate the tree, and please don't tell your brother."

Soooo, let's leap forward 30 years when I have begun living the lie that is Santa. When I was a child, Santa had Herculean responsibility. He delivered all of the presents, decorated the tree and polished off the cookies before going onto the next house. I felt sure that I could fulfill that contract with my own children. Only to discover, like the whole fallacy of Santa himself, that it was not all it was cracked up to be. As a matter of fact, after about 10 years of this nonsense, I started dropping hints to my third grader calling into question the existence of Santa. All for naught. He is in 8th grade and is still maintaining that there is a Santa Claus because I would never buy such fun presents. (I am a drudge.)

The other day, my 4th grader and I were driving somewhere and he was reading toy catalogue entries to me with the preface, "All is want for Christmas is (fill in the blank)." I was getting fed up with the unbridled greed and I dropped the bombshell that I was Santa Claus.

Silence.

I thought the topic was dropped and the news accepted. Of course not! Two days later we were in the car again, and John burst into angry tears, and said, "Does Dan know about Santa Claus? Why did you tell me?" I cringed and visions of therapy bills danced in my head.

I am still not sure why I did it, but you know what? Both boys refuse to believe me, so I guess I need to start believing myself.