Tygarjas Twyrls Blog

Since I’ve been hearing this song just about everyday during the yearly ritual of the preparation for the annual celebration of the culmination of greed of capitalism praying on the insecurity of consumers, a question has consistently arisen to my mind every time I hear the song play, “This must have had long term consequences to the psyche of this child. What must the consequences to this child’s mind have been?”

20 Years Ago Last Night . . .

I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus, underneath the mistletoe, 20 years ago from last night.

Two weeks later, when I went back to school, little Cindy Sandra Morgan was telling her friends that her parents were getting a divorce. I was only five then, I’d never heard the word “divorce.” And then she went on to tell them that her father had been sleeping around on her mother. Apparently Cindy’s mom had been something of an alcoholic, and as she fled to stay with her mom, Cindy’s Grandmother, she had been drinking a lot. Apparently Cindy had spent much of her Winter break listening to her mom tell her all about adultery and divorces through whiskey-soaked breath while Grandma was asleep late at night. She said something about waking up late to get a drink of water, and she was going to check on the cookies she had left for Santa when her mother, sitting in a rocking chair in a dark corner of the room, told her to come over and sit down by the foot of the chair. Cindy told her friends that her mom smelled like bad, strong pickles, and that her mom told her all about what she called “sleeping around” and “divorces.”

I mean, in retrospect, my father role playing with my mom was really quite healthy. But I didn’t learn about sexual role playing until I was a junior in high-school, and I didn’t really understand it in-depth in terms of relationships until I was well into my second year of college taking an introductory course to psychology. Can you imagine? At five years old I was still quite convinced of Santa’s existence. I thought my Mommy was sleeping around on my Daddy until I was about twelve. I didn’t dare say anything to Dad, I didn’t want my parents divorcing. When Santa came to visit Christmas Eve the next year, it was all I could do to keep from breaking down in tears at once. And it strained my relationship with my mom. I kept thinking that she was going to break Daddy’s heart because she couldn’t “keep it in her pants.”

And when I was seven, instead of Santa coming over on Christmas Eve, we went to see him at the mall. It was horrible. I spent weeks avoiding the mall. And then when we started walking by the Christmas display, there I was on the other side of Mommy trying not to look at “Santa’s workshop.” But then Mommy took me by the hand and started pulling me that way, and I couldn’t say no without her finding out that I knew about her and Santa. So there I was waiting in line to meet Santa, and wanting to escape, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. And by the time I was seven I’d heard the term “Can’t keep her legs together,” and was  wondering why Mommy couldn’t. And then there I was on Santa’s lap, and he asked me what I wanted, and I told him. I motioned that I wanted to whisper in his ear, and I told him. “Please stop trying to make my parents divorce. Please.” And no wonder he gave me a strange look. And then he started laughing a typical Santa “Ho, ho, ho.” And in retrospect he was just nervous because he didn’t know how to respond to that and was trying to buy himself time to answer in a helpful way. And he was about to say something, but before he could, I hopped right down from his lap and kicked him as hard as I could in the shin! Mommy looked so embarrassed as she took my hand, apologizing as we went. And then when we got to the car she asked me what I was thinking, but I just sat and didn’t say anything, trying to avoid her gaze. I didn’t want her to know I knew about her and Santa.

That was the last time I ever sat on Santa’s lap, or that Santa ever visited our house. But I didn’t care. I spent the next five years in dread of Christmas, but every time I didn’t see Santa I smiled quietly to myself that I had saved my parents’ marriage.

When I was almost twelve I finally understood that Santa wasn’t real; that Dad had been Santa. And that was weird thinking about my parent’s kissing at all, let alone my Dad dressed as Santa. But then the guilt started to seep in. Guilt, and the realization, that would take the next several years to unfold, that I’d deprived myself of one of my favorite parts of childhood. Every year I go broke around Christmas time. Not because of the gifts I give to others, but because every time I pass a Good-Will Santa I put five bucks in his bucket thinking that maybe this Santa is the one I kicked in the shin all those years ago, and that maybe my donations will make up for hurting someone just trying to make little kids happy, and make up for how I messed up my own childhood.

Most people have neurosis that were passed to them from their parents. Mine was completely self-afflicted. So, my kids will never think that Santa is real, and they’ll always get good presents, whatever they want. And if their Mommy ever cheats on me, I’ll just make sure I make her death look like it was caused naturally so that they don’t have to suffer the prospect of divorce like I had to. When I have kids, they will always enjoy Christmas!