At what point in time does Santa no longer become the person who leaves you presents?
Now, I'm not going to give away any sort of secrets here, because you never know the severity of heartbreak one may cause by 'outing' Santa. (And you never know who can read, and who can't.) But for those of you who know what I'm talking about... well, explain to me how this is all done. How does the 'outing' happen?
(Oh, I just know someone out there is going, "Santa's gay?")
(And if you are thinking that, my only reply can be - it depends on your Santa.)
I'm a little disturbed by the lengths some people go to during Christmas time. They get phone calls from the big guy, letters, pictures, etc... And not that I think anything is wrong with that, but I'm a little worried for the psyche of the child who believes with all their heart. I'm worried about the horrible feeling of betrayal they'll feel when they find out that Santa may not really be magical. (Not that I'm saying he's not! I'm not ruining anyone's Christmas here, guys! I said he MAY not be magical. MAY not be. Which means he MAY really be!)
I don't remember a definitive moment when it all came together for me. I don't know if it just wasn't a big deal for me, of if maybe I'm just blocking it all out because it was so mentally scarring. Regardless, I don't know how it happened in my childhood. Do you remember? Was it awful? Or was it just like, eh, whatever?
Because I'm a little afraid of getting myself in too deep around here, and stomping my tender-hearted children's hearts into the ground. I'm avoiding putting our name on the phone call list, and I sure as heck don't want to do personnal correspondence, lest they develop a deep relationship with someone who will later be 'outed' as not being anything close to what they thought 'he' was.
Or maybe I will never tell them the, um, secret, and put them in an isolated bubble for the rest of their lives.
Option two is sounding very good to me right now.
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3 comments:
i'm a little torn on this one.....
~ we DO make santa LISTS (more for me than santa) and i take them to the mall to sit on santas lap. oh, and i tell them if they don't sit on his lap and tell him what they want then he won't come to our house (i just want the damn pic!!! ~ although i'm thinking this will be the last year i MAKE them)
~ we don't make every present from santa (just a few) ~ although i know families who do (and who are starting to have problems explaining things)
~ we DO make cookies and leave them out for santa on christmas eve
~ they know that christmas is the birthday for baby jesus and that is why we celebrate
~ i try to tell them that it's better to give than recieve
i don't remember when i stopped believing that santa was real....but i know that i never stopped liking the whole idea of santa!!!
and i think i'd rather have my kids believe but know the truth then be that kid at school who is defending santa because his parents never told him the truth...
TORN is the way to describe how I feel about all this too. The kids make cookies every Christmas Eve, and write lists sometimes. They are believers, but I'm afraid of hyping it too much.
What I REALLY don't want though, is (like you said) for them to be the ones defending the whole idea when they're, like, 12 or something.
(Also, I don't want them to be ruining other children's beliefs and making small children cry.) (But that's true for all things!)
My son definitely still believes. My daughter is 9 and very much ahead of her age...sometimes the posts you write about your daughter remind me of Olivia. Anyway, she still believes, or says she does. And the thing is, I don't know if she truly still believes, or if she is just doing it to condescend to me. We have never really gone to any great lengths, other than lists and cookies, and I don't remember ever finding out that Santa wasn't what I always thought he was. I just think it's one of those things that works itself out in time. Eventually, your kids will get hip to the reality of things and you can playfully insist there really is a Santa. To this day, my Dad still tells me I should ask Santa for big ticket items. And magically, the big guy still comes through!
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