The Night Before Christmas

I don’t know when I stopped believing in Santa Claus but I do remember when I started. I must’ve been 6 or 7. Every thing I knew, I learned from TV. So, I knew I was supposed to write a wish list and send it to the North Pole. I was old enough to know to put mail in an envelope with a stamp. I think I knew to put a return address on the envelope. I don’t know, however, if I knew that most addresses needed a zip code. I know for certain, I didn’t have a zip code for the North Pole and I couldn’t find it in the phone book. But that didn’t worry me so much; the most important thing I knew was that my stocking would be full Christmas morning if I had been good that year. And of course, I knew I had to leave out cookies.

So, I never shared my list with my parents. This deal was between me and the Claus. I don’t even know how much my immigrant parents understood about the whole Santa-business with his workshop of elves and his toy-filled sleigh. They were too busy feeding and clothing a household with themselves, 6 children and 2 grandparents on grueling minimum wage jobs. The main thing we had in our home to celebrate the holidays was a $4.99 Charlie Brown tree from the local hardware store–Chubby & Tubby– decorated with colored balls and metallic silver tinsel purchased at the Pay n’ Save. We had some gifts under the tree but gift giving was never very elaborate in our simple home. So, I relied on Santa to bring the magic of Christmas to us on Christmas day.

I remember the first year I sent a letter to Santa because I had worked so hard on it (especially checking the phone book for the North Pole zip code). I remember being ridiculously excited on the night before Christmas but forcing myself to go to sleep so Santa could come. Then I remember waking up at the crack of dawn, running out to the living room straight to my lone stocking hung on the fire place only to find…nothing. I reached my hand in and didn’t even find coal. There was simply nothing. I shook it upside down and turned it inside out and still…nothing. Then I sat there, dumbfounded. Dumbfounded and racking my brain on how I hadn’t been good that year. There were times I would remember instances, like I hadn’t been nice to so and so on the playground and that must have been what I had done to deserve the empty stocking. Then I would swear to myself that I’d be better the next year and that I would get back on Santa’s good side.

Then the next year would come and the same thing would happen. I’d feel so ashamed that I was on Santa’s naughty list and I’d swear again that I’d be better, that I’d be good the next year. The year after that, I decided to attempt an all-nighter and listen for the reindeer hooves and jingling bells. I remember moving up and down off and on the sofa to look out the frosty window to see if I saw Santa on anyone else’s rooftop. When that got tiresome, I would let myself turn off the lights and just sit with the Christmas tree lights so Santa would think that I was asleep. Then I would let myself lay down on the sofa…only to wake up the next morning mad at myself for falling asleep. Upon gaining my senses, I’d look over at the plate of cookies I left and it would still be full and my stocking would still be empty.

When I learned that Santa didn’t exist, I don’t think I ever put it together that that was why my stocking had been empty all those years. Instead, I think it just lodged in my psyche that I was just never good enough to get a visit from St. Nick.

I didn’t write a list this year; I haven’t in a really long time since I stopped believing in Santa. I didn’t even get a tree or hang up a stocking. But when I look out the frosty window this night before Christmas, I can’t help but look at my neighbors’ rooftops just to see what might be up there. I no longer question whether he’ll come down my chimney but I do still question if I am good enough to get the things that I wish for. Funny how some things from our childhood just stay with us.

— Ballyhoo Backcaster