Do you tell your children about Santa? Some few consider that to be bad, but not most.
I've been thinking about this "santa" thing and it's treated pretty flippantly. When we were young my sister and I knew that "santa" was deeply implausible. Our parents never tried to convince us otherwise. They kept up the charade, though, because it was fun - we put out cookies, Santa did certain things, and there was stuff we didn't know about and there were things we couldn't explain. Mostly because "mom and dad did it" was a boring answer that sucked all the fun out of it, so we deliberately didn't give the answer much credo. "Santa" is a deliberate choice by all parties involved to pretend about. The parents know, the kids know, yet the parents "lie" and the kids "choose to believe the lie." My daughter is not quite a year old. She has a favorite puppet. His name is Gus. He's a baby sloth. My daughter knows that I am Gus, that Gus does nothing without me making him do it, and that when Gus makes noises, my lips move. Yet she hugs Gus, she makes faces at Gus, she plays with Gus, and she treats Gus like he were a puppy she were playing with. Every now and then, she looks up and grins at me. We're playing Pretend and we both know it, and it's fun for both of us. The Santa thing is no different. Saying parents "lie about Santa" does a disservice to play and the imagination.
My three year old daughter heard a song about Santa the other day- it got to a verse about "Santa comes down the chimney yadda yadda yadda" and my daughter goes "That's silly- Santa can't fit down a chimney." I couldn't for the life of me bring myself to say otherwise. Fucking chimney. Who thought up this shit?
Washington Irving.and as of yore, in the better days of man, the deities were wont to visit him on earth and bless his rural habitations, so we are told, in the sylvan days of New Amsterdam, the good St. Nicholas would often make his appearance in his beloved city, of a holiday afternoon, riding jollily among the treetops, or over the roofs of houses, now and then drawing forth magnificent presents from his breeches pockets, and dropping them down the chimneys of his favorites. Whereas, in these degenerate days of iron and brass he never shows us the light of his countenance, nor ever visits us, save one night in the year; when he rattles down the chimneys of the descendants of the patriarchs, confining his presents merely to the children, in token of the degeneracy of the parents.
So not only did he give us the chimney nonsense, but he had to make Christmas a "fall from grace" thing, too. Buzzkill. "Well, Hazel, you see, it might seem silly that Santa comes down the chimney, but it makes total sense. For one, he's a demigod, with all the magical power that entails. So there's that. Moreover, daddy's a filthy sinner, so... you know. Chimney. Makes sense." Nope, not gonna do it. We don't even have a goddamn chimney. Santa's walking through the door this year.
That's nothing. Clarke Clement Moore wrote 'Twas the night before Christmas' on commission for the NYPD because they were sick of all the immigrants rioting and looting and getting into fights and wanted some psyops to flip Christmas from "drunken debauchery a la Mardi Gras" to "family-friendly God-fearing event." I'll likely post this again after Thanksgiving, but have a head start - the single best program The History Channel has ever run.
That's all true, and I agree - my childhood Santa memories are much the same. I think it's especially sweet when kids get old enough to know it's pretend, but they go along with it, indeed want to go along with it - for the sake of those younger than themselves. It's a tiny step in growing up. Learning to lie for a good reason.
This came up over the weekend. I brought a package in and a few hours later there were some presents under the tree. "Who brought those presents?" the kid asked. "Fedex brought them." "I'm going to clip her up." (Note: "clipping up" is a positive reinforcement at the kindergarten -- get clipped up a few times, and you get a prize from the treasure chest.) But a little while later, he asked me if Santa hadn't really brought them. I equivocated, but it became obvious that he understood pretty well that Santa is in the same category as the talking Frog and Toad. He wants the story, so I'll give it to him. But I won't use it as a deceitful mechanism of threatening consequences for misbehavior. At least, not if I can come up with something else that works.