Not long ago, I tweeted about the inevitable question from my 10 year old: "Mom, are you and Dad really Santa Claus?"
My first response: "Have you talked to your father?"
The Boy: "No," as he headed for the telephone.
My expert deflective maneuvering skills were good enough to put the conversation in dad's court only until he punted back to me.
"What do you want for dinner?" I hurriedly asked my son while rushing to the kitchen.
Fast forward a few weeks to one of our many mundane car trips to class. "I know that Santa is just you and Dad."
"How do you know?"
"Because I talked to Dad and I recognized his handwriting one time."
Sigh. After confirming by phone with his father that, indeed, they'd had "The Talk" and my son wasn't just trying to pull a good one on his rattle-brained old lady, I flashed him a crooked smile.
"Yeah. That was us."
"I knew it."
"So, what do you think about that? Does it make you sad?"
"Me? No! I mean, c'mon... A fat man in a red suit comes down the chimney and eats your cookies?! The guy should've been sued by now!"
For a bit there, amid our raucous laughter, The Boy felt victorious over The Old People. I felt relieved at how letting go of this part of his childhood was easier than I anticipated. I told him about how playing Santa was one of the most exhilarating tasks of parenthood for me: buying and hiding googahs that only Santa would bring, stumbling around in the late night Christmas Eve dark, trying to keep quiet while assembling complicated playscapes, sometimes dragging myself back out of bed before dawn to make sure I'd taken a few bites of those apparently-valuable cookies...
My Almost-Teenager agreed that he would, as his father had earlier made him sworn to do, vigilantly keep the secret held among Former Believers.
Then I introduced the new version of Christmas sans Santa: fewer gifts, fewer surprises, hand-in-hand with a new appreciation for the phrase "No, we can't afford that right now..."
But oh, my clever boy... "I know. I can give you guys a list of the things I want and then you pick some and don't tell me which ones. I can still be surprised!"
This is my absolute favorite age, hands-down.
My first response: "Have you talked to your father?"
The Boy: "No," as he headed for the telephone.
My expert deflective maneuvering skills were good enough to put the conversation in dad's court only until he punted back to me.
"What do you want for dinner?" I hurriedly asked my son while rushing to the kitchen.
Fast forward a few weeks to one of our many mundane car trips to class. "I know that Santa is just you and Dad."
"How do you know?"
"Because I talked to Dad and I recognized his handwriting one time."
Sigh. After confirming by phone with his father that, indeed, they'd had "The Talk" and my son wasn't just trying to pull a good one on his rattle-brained old lady, I flashed him a crooked smile.
"Yeah. That was us."
"I knew it."
"So, what do you think about that? Does it make you sad?"
"Me? No! I mean, c'mon... A fat man in a red suit comes down the chimney and eats your cookies?! The guy should've been sued by now!"
For a bit there, amid our raucous laughter, The Boy felt victorious over The Old People. I felt relieved at how letting go of this part of his childhood was easier than I anticipated. I told him about how playing Santa was one of the most exhilarating tasks of parenthood for me: buying and hiding googahs that only Santa would bring, stumbling around in the late night Christmas Eve dark, trying to keep quiet while assembling complicated playscapes, sometimes dragging myself back out of bed before dawn to make sure I'd taken a few bites of those apparently-valuable cookies...
My Almost-Teenager agreed that he would, as his father had earlier made him sworn to do, vigilantly keep the secret held among Former Believers.
Then I introduced the new version of Christmas sans Santa: fewer gifts, fewer surprises, hand-in-hand with a new appreciation for the phrase "No, we can't afford that right now..."
But oh, my clever boy... "I know. I can give you guys a list of the things I want and then you pick some and don't tell me which ones. I can still be surprised!"
This is my absolute favorite age, hands-down.
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