Crustaceas Santas

If you've been following this blog at all then it will come as no surprise to you when I say that I've always been a bit of a worrier. (At this time, please refrain from smirking at your computer monitor and yelling, "Uh, yeah... Ya think?!") I've pretty much made an art form out of it. I can worry myself into a tightly wound bundle of nerves over just about anything. Growing up, I nearly made myself sick stressing about homework, failed alarm clocks, earthquake escape routes, undetected diseases, and the resurrection of Richard Ramirez (a.k.a the Night Stalker) who I believed had some unfinished business with me. And it's only intensified with motherhood. Now my fears and anxieties involve strange-looking rashes, sharp objects in little hands, asthmatic coughing attacks, delayed language, and unlocked doors from which Bonnie and Clyde could escape unnoticed.

Unfortunately, I may have passed this worrying gene on to Lil' Miss. The girl definitely has her share of phobias. These include but are not limited to face paint, old people with long hair, masks, old people with long beards, character costumes, and old people with loud voices. As you can imagine, this does not bode well for a certain gift-giving grandpa-type who we like to make a big deal about this time of year. Santa is definitely outside the Christmas periphery in our house. Literally. Lil' Miss has made it perfectly clear that he's not welcomed in here. No rooftop. No chimney. No tiptoe-ing around our living room with that long white beard and crazy red suit. She's agreed to leave a plate of cookies and a glass of milk out on the front porch for him in exchange for the presents he promised, but that's as close as he'll be getting to this house.

The advent calendar she picked out says it all.

Yep, it was the only Christmas scene where Santa was OUTSIDE, peeking in through the window.

I really thought I had Lil' Miss's Scorn of Santa all figured out. I believed in time she'd grow to love that white hair and beard as much as all the other kids in the world did. But a recent conversation revealed that I didn't have a clue about the nature of my daughter's fear.

We were all sitting around the kitchen table talking about Christmas when Honk in usual fashion pushed the Santa issue a bit too hard. "Are you SURE you don't want to sleep out on the couch so you can see Santa when he comes down the chimney?" (Why do boys taunt us so?) Lil' Miss immediately curled up into herself and hid behind one of the chairs. She wouldn't even respond to his question. She was truly panicked at the prospect of that scenario. I think it was the first time Honk realized how intense her fear of Santa was and he whispered to me, "Man, she's seriously freaked out by him!"

Wanting him to understand her the way I thought I did, I suggested, "Lil' Miss, why don't you tell Daddy why you're scared of Santa."

Slowly, she crept out from behind the chair and held up her hands like she was making sock puppets. Then she opened and closed them like Pac Man and said, "Well, there's his Santa claws..."

Are you kidding me? Had the poor girl really mistaken his last name for a pair of pointed appendages? No wonder she didn't want to have anything to do with him! Santa was really just a GIANT LOBSTER disguised behind a long white beard and red suit! Now when I think about all those times we begged her to take a picture on Santa's lap, her butt cheeks only inches away from those sharp pinchers craftily hidden in his furry gloves... I can still see the absolute terror on her face.

As much as I liked the idea of Santa, I've decided to let it go. He's not the true meaning of Christmas anyways. And now I have one less thing to worry about as a mother. There's no longer a reason to fear the day I'll have to tell Lil' Miss that Santa doesn't really exist. She will not shed tears and her heart will not be broken. Quite the opposite, in fact. That revelation would probably be the best Christmas gift I could give her.