Santa Situation

Recently I saw a two year old or so in age on Santa’s lap on a Boston television news program. He was deaf-person signing to his parents the word “help.”

Toddler signs for ‘help’ while sitting on Santa’s lap | Daily Mail Online

6 days ago – Mother shares a photo of her adorable toddler signing for ‘help‘ while sitting on Santa’s lap. … A Maryland woman shared an adorable snap of her son signing for ‘help‘ while sitting on Santa’s lap when he was just a toddler. … Toddler signalshelp‘ in sign language while sitting on …

Personally, I have no problem with Santa, whose mythic figure is based on Saint Nick:

St. Nicholas, Santa Claus and Father Christmas — Christmas Customs …

The Story of St. Nicholas and how he became the traditional Santa Claus and Father Christmas. His history, connections to Coca-Cola and Harper’s Weekly and what he does now!

Now while a lot of young children are alarmed in his lap, I was not. Certainly, he dresses in a funny way and looks strange. Certainly, it could be scary to be plunked down in a stranger’s lap — especially one as odd looking in facial features (as compared to the norm) as he is.

It didn’t bother me as a young child. I’d already seen people, friends of my parents, dressed in not normative attire relative to our culture of Northeastern USA. I had seen maimed, odd looking women (Hiroshima Maidens) in NY, USA for reconstructive surgery and, so, his clothing, nor odd looks wouldn’t bother me.

I had been introduced to all sorts of people from various cultures around the world, who hugged and petted me. So sitting on his lap was going to be easy.

I was five years old and  my parents told me that I should tell him about what I want for Christmas. So I should figure it out.

Then the next day after they’d asked me to reflect on the topic, I was put on Santa’s knee. Then he asked me about what I, little girl, wanted for Christmas.

I was primed the day beforehand and so I was totally ready. I stared at his eyes and said, “I want world peace. Can you work on it?”

I was thinking at the time about wars and bombs, Hiroshima Maidens maimed and other related issues. (How typical of me back then and now. … You have no idea about the way that seeing mangled Hiroshima Maidens dropped me to my knees and transformed me at age five.)

He got a little shaken up by my reply. I could tell that this was the case as he looked startled and, then, recomposed himself. Then he said that he’d work on it.

What about yourself, though. What do you want for yourself? This was his next enquiry.

So I said dolls since I like dolls since I can use them in dramas — plays — that I put together and proudly told him that I had watched plays on stage since I was a baby.

I told him that I was reading already. (By third grade I was at ninth grade level for ready capability, including comprehension, and by fifth grade, I measured up to eleventh, but I was already raiding my parents’  higher level bookshelves.) So I like books, but not stupid ones to him, I said.

Then I said that I want candy since I like sugar. So I could take some candy for Christmas, please.

Oh, what do you do with a child like me? What do you do with a child like the one that I had? … Hahaha, try raising us.  What a riot!

At aged four, my own little girl and I stood in a line for a half hour to sit in Santa’s lap. We were at North Pole, NY, Home of Santa’s Workshop in the Adirondacks, NY. When she was only two children behind for sitting on his lap, she broke out of the line and said that she could not sit on his knee. Then we fled away.

Okay. So we feed reindeer instead — crackers and such.

Then the next year, she brought a Santa in Marlboro, MA, USA presents that she wrapped for financially poor children. He was in a trailer in the center of town collecting presents.

She did not sit on his lap. She just passed the presents to him hand to hand — ones that she had picked out in a toy store and crudely wrapped all by herself. … She was learning to wrap. So her efforts were not totally perfect and they were wrapped a little oddly.

A few weeks later, we were in the US Virgin Islands, where my mother had a home. So we were walking in St. Thomas and she sees a skinny dark skinned man walking in a Santa suit on the street and she did a double-take. Whoa- what’s that?

She said something like, “Huh, how come that Santa became so dark and why is he so thin?”

I just started to laugh and said that he may have working on getting a tan before Christmas day so as to getting dark. Still in mirth, I said, that maybe he was on a diet for cardiac health and, so, lost weight.

Then still laughing, I told her the truth that Santa is a metaphor for giving people what they most need and want in life. I told her that lots of people dress up in Santa suits all across the world to enact this role and spirit of giving.

Then I told her about St. Nick on whom the vision is roughly based. She grinned and ran ahead to hug the black-skinned scrawny Santa that was just a few feet ahead of us on the sidewalk. It was the first time that she felt comfortable enough to touch a Santa.

Hey, how about having Santa across all religions? He’s a pretty neat archetype of goodness and giving, eh? Incorporate him if you want and his costume is way to delightful!

Our myths, values and ideals keep humanity primed to be the best that it can be. So let’s have white, dark, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and other Santas. He represents the giving spirit!

Santa represents love, giving, generosity and many other positive traits. My daughter and I know it, and she recently put her one and a half year old daughter on his knee.

That was another laugh for me. The expression on the child’s face was hilarious as she was baffled.

Yet I know the meaning that my daughter is imparting. We are passing along the tradition that Santa represents. It will pass generation by generation from before me and past my grandchild. What a joy!

I love Santa. He gave me a chance to explain myself as a helpless little child trying to say about what I want for the world and myself. He listened like a psychotherapist to my desires. He represented empowerment for me in terms of my wishes. So he gave me hope!

Who cares if he is largely a myth? I do not at all because he represents the cultural training that we all must become: to listen to wants for betterment in the world and ourselves, and deliver them if we can!
Related image

Santa Claus Is Coming To Town – Bruce Springsteen – YouTube

Dec 4, 2011 – Uploaded by δωεετρεα

Santa Claus is coming to town by Bruce Springsteen. I DO NOT OWN ANYTHING IN THIS VIDEO,ALL THE …

Sally Dugman is a writer in MA, USA

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