The intersection of story and memory and perception is a funny thing.  It isn’t just the details of the narrative but how we perceived it at the time – in other words it’s not just what happened but how did our five year old self understand what was happening  – that’s where the story lives.

Our kids will tell you that we didn’t “do Santa Claus” for religious reasons. In fact, the truth is nothing so noble. Paul and I were both raised on the fat man in the red suit who brought toys to good boys and girls. As parents, we didn’t do Santa Claus because we couldn’t afford many presents and I wanted the credit for giving them the cool gift. There, I’ve said it out loud and now you know what a truly selfish and awful person I really am. I wasn’t going to let Santa swoop in at the last minute to give them that thing I had scrimped and saved and stood in the blocks-long line to get the day it went on sale. The jolly old man had made not one sacrifice to obtain this year’s must-have toy, and he certainly was not going to get to play the hero in my stead. 

Our kids each got three gifts from us – I think because that’s the way it was in Paul’s family. We tried to get them one thing they really wanted, and then the other two were something small:  a book, a craft, something to go with their toy (an outfit for the new doll, etc.) or maybe new pajamas or slippers (One year I sewed nightgowns and robes for all the girls.  Don’t ask – I have no idea why I thought that was a good idea. This is the same year that Sean found the scraps of fabric on my bedroom floor and was convinced I was making them a Punch & Judy puppet show. Who knows where that came from ??!!)   These gifts were purchased, wrapped and hidden away until Christmas morning. 

The little gifts they made or bought for one another and for us were carefully selected and fussed over (was this really what she would like or maybe it was that or maybe something else all together??), then wrapped with care and lots of tape and placed under the tree to be poked and prodded and arranged and rearranged all through the weeks leading up to Christmas (and sometimes re-wrapped). 

Until Christmas morning.

After they are asleep – or all in bed with a promise of physical harm should they exit their bedroom before morning – Paul and I bring out our oh-so-carefully-chosen and hopefully something-they-will-love offerings.  Gifts are always arranged in piles according to the giver so that the emphasis will be on “what you are giving” instead of “what you are getting”. Everything you are giving to someone else is placed in a stack at your spot with your stocking – hand crocheted  by Grandma Fletch – and then we wait for the morning. 

No one is allowed to leave their bedroom until you hear the music – Manheim Steamroller’s Deck the Halls – blasting loudly enough to wake the dead.  Of course, they are all awake, or maybe had never gone to sleep, but they dutifully wait for their cue. The music calls to them and here they come, scrambling down the stairs or up the stairs depending on where their bedroom is, running to find their stocking and their pile of gifts to give and eyeing the stack in front of Mom & Dad.  Those will be the last ones distributed.  

We start with the youngest who gets to choose in which order he or she wishes to bestow what everyone already knows will be a Life Saver Storybook. I no longer remember how this tradition began, but early on it was the mandated gift that the youngest among them gives to the older siblings. With much fan-fare, everyone oooohs and awwwwwws over it as though it is the biggest surprise of the season and one which they cannot possibly live without. 

Gifts are opened one at a time since this allows for time to admire and exclaim over each one and we all compliment the giver on his or her good taste. One by one, we ceremoniously present our gifts  to one another and everyone watches as each one is opened. This takes awhile and has the added benefit of alleviating the frenzied ripping of paper that inevitably leads to mass confusion and chaos and cuts down on the number of times we will need to dig through the trash looking for a lost doll shoe, Lego piece or other sundry tiny items. Plus it stretches out the festivities and makes more of a party, which in our family is always a good thing.  

And that was Christmas morning.   

I don’t know if our kids missed not “doing Santa”.  The truth is I never asked them.  I realized pretty early on though that we needed to have “the talk” if we didn’t  want our friends and neighbors to hate us and our kids. “Some people like to pretend that Santa Clause is real,” we explained, “and that he is the one who brings their children presents and so you can help them by not saying anything that would make them out to be a liar.” I mean, we didn’t say it exactly like that, but we had to coach them up a little to keep the peace.

And then there was the year that one of our Sunday School teachers at church killed Santa Claus. He wanted to teach a lesson about the real Saint Nicholas and how the “Santa Claus” of today grew out of the myths and legends (danger Will Robinson!!) around this real man who lived in the third century.  And while I’m sure he meant well (you can probably see already how fraught with peril this plan was), he somehow failed to see the landmine he was about to trip over. So somewhere in his lesson about this kind and generous patron saint of children, he comes to the place in the story where Saint Nichols  dies. Now to a small child, who only vaguely understands anything you have said up to this point but who thinks you are telling him that Santa Clause and Saint Nicholas are one and the same, this is, of course, alarming.  “Santa Claus died?” asks a small voice in the front row.

At this point, any thinking person would have abandoned his ill-conceived lesson and just gone straight to the craft tables, but he soldiers on. Another little voice, with a hint of a quiver, asks “How did he die?” And then the mother of all landmines: “He was martyred,” says the teacher.  KABOOM!!  While most sources say Saint Nicholas was persecuted for this faith, I can’t find anybody who says he was martyred, but given this was before the internet, maybe this teacher didn’t have access to good research or maybe he just thought it made for a better story.

At any rate, that’s what the teacher said. Now there is a full-blown panic rising from the masses as one child jumps to his feet and yells  SANTA CLAUS WAS MURDERED??!!  (martyred or murdered – what’s the difference, really?) And it was at this moment that all hell broke loose and became known in the history of our church as “The Day Cedarbrook Killed Santa Claus.” Our son, who was about 10 and one of the older kids in the class, was standing in the back of the room with a friend who says to him, “Do you still believe in Santa Claus?”  Nope.  “Me neither. But I sure feel sorry for these kids.”

We fielded a deluge of calls from irate parents that week, letting us know how traumatized their children were as a result of the Sunday School lesson and that when it came time to explain the “Santa situation”, they had expected to be the ones to do it and they certainly would have handled it much differently, thank you very much.  

And though I didn’t say it, because I thought it might be too soon, I thought about telling them, “Yes, but just think, now you’ll get to take credit for all that stuff under the tree.”