Yesterday Tammy told me a comment Kayden made after seeing Santa Claus at a store. It got me to thinking about the difference between Christmas Past and Christmas Present. I don't just mean MY particular Christmases, but Christmas in general. I've seen a difference in children's reaction to the excitement of Christmas during my 25 years of teaching school. And there is a great difference between the excitement of Christmas 50 years ago and now. I know a lot of my thinking has changed because of my age, but I don't see the excitement in kids that I felt when I was younger. And I think it is all because of Santa.
Back in the "olden days", when I was young and walked uphill both ways to school with my pet dinosaur, Christmas was a magical time of year. Back then the little town of Orangeville was decorated with strings of lights across the main street in town. Actually going clear across the street from one side to the other. There might have been one set of lights on each side street leading off main street. I remember a string of lights that rotated position on the road outside our house. Some years it was in front of the Joneses, sometimes in front of our house, and sometimes in front of Albertson's house. As you drove into town I was thrilled to see those lights. It was magical. There weren't any "fancy" ornaments on the power/telephone poles, just the lights across the street. Sometimes a ligh bulb would be knocked out by boys throwing rocks, but they were quickly replaced. Sometime along the years someone said the lights had to come down because they confused the people who were looking at the stop lights? In Orangeville there are no stop lights, so how was it confusing? At any rate, now there are just decorations on the sides of the street. They are nice, but not the same as the lights across the street.
So,to get to Santa. Back in those olden days, we were very lucky if we saw Santa even once during the holiday season. Santa usually came to visit with us at the ward Christmas party. We always had a primary program for the ward Christmas party, where the children were the actors in the first Christmas pageant. The girls were angels with halos in our hair. Some one would get lucky and be asked to play the part of Mary. A doll stood in for the baby Jesus. The boys got the fun parts of the Wise Men, the Shepherds, and Joseph. Everyone else just stood around with their halos and sang. After the program we would meet in the foyers of the church where there was a VERY TALL Christmas tree all decorated with ornaments, lights, and tinsel. There would be a special chair for Santa and we would crowd around to hear what everyone else wanted for Christmas. It was so exciting to finally get to talk with Santa himself and tell him our wishes. That was most likely the only time you saw Santa until the next year.
These days, children see Santa everywhere they go. They are smart enough to know that every one can't possibly be Santa. So parents have an extra difficult time explaining all the Santas to their children. I think it takes away from the excitement of seeing that one special Santa. Which one is really the real Santa?
Over the past 10 years we have shared in the excitement of Santa with children. We have been blessed to help children see the excitement of seeing Sanata up close and personal. We have been in attendence at several city parties where Santa has talked with children, and then been with Santa the next day as he talked with the same children again, sometimes more than 2 times during a season. I remember one year a special young boy had been on Santa's knee for two weekends in a row. He turned to his mother and said "That is the real Santa because I saw him last week, too!"
In my growing up years Santa was always the "Real Santa" because I only got to see him once a year. He was too busy to come too often, so one visit was all you got.
Are we taking away the magic of Christmas when Santa is on every street corner, and in every store and bank, and every city party ? I don't mean to be a Scrooge, but I don't think it is as special and exciting for children to even seen Santa any more, not like it was for us back then. Maybe too much is not a good thing. Just wondering.
2 comments:
I loved the standing around Santa that we used to do. Standing in line on by one just doesn't seem right. But we were very quiet and took turns and there were no parents pushing their child to the front.
Also - the ward party was on Christmas eve and everyone still had "family" get togethers. But to see Santa on Christmas eve was a wonderful treat.
Thank you, for I feel the same way. Where has the magic of Christmas disappeared to? Paul and I talked about it a few weeks before Christmas. I long for my Grandkids to experience a magical Christmas. Where they become excited about Christmas lights. Seeing Santa gives them a thrill that they won't receive any other time of the year. I remember those lights across the street. We would sit in the front room waiting for someone to come and turn them on. We would become so excited. As for the Christmas eve parties, they are some of my greatest memories. I can even remember some of the new dresses we also recieved that night. I can even remember a Christmas eve program was my first experience of wearing nylons, not pantyhose, nylons.
Thank you again for the memories.
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