Christmas is the time of year when people exchange hellos and good buys with each other and when mothers have to separate the men from the toys. Christmas is a joyous occasion illuminated by candles and graced by decorations, ornamented Christmas trees, poinsettias, traditional songs and carols, church services, family feasts, the exchange of gifts and greeting cards, and the donning of ugly sweaters. Celebrants eagerly wait for the arrival of Santa Claus — also known as Saint Nicholas, Kriss Kringle, Father Christmas, simply Santa, or, in my fevered brain, The Abdominal Snowman.
Did you know that Santa’s first language is North Polish? Santa and Mrs. Claus live in an icicle built for two. He lovingly tends his garden, all the while laughing, “Hoe, hoe, hoe!”
Santa always wears the same suit, but it stays clean because Mrs. Claus washes it in Yule Tide. Part of that suit is a black belt, which Santa earned in karate. But no matter how much he works out, Saint Nick suffers from a number of health problems, including mistle toe, tinselitis, and hollytosis.
Santa is the main Claus. His wife is a relative Claus. His children are dependent Clauses. As a group, they’re all renoun Clauses. And the father of Father Christmas is a Grandfather Claus.
Santa’s elves are subordinate Clauses. They’re generous souls, not elfish. They study the elf-abet so that they can file correctly, but like all staff, they do all the work, and the fat guy in the suit gets all the credit.
As they make toys, the elves sing, “Love Me Tender.” That’s why they’re known as Santa’s little Elvis. As they put the toys in boxes and prepare them for Santa’s sack, they listen to wrap music. They also take a lot of elfies.
On Christmas Eve, Santa eats a jolly roll and leaps into his Holly-Davidson sleigh. which always comes out first because it starts in the Pole position. It gets terrific mileage because it has long-distance runners on each side.
Santa especially loves all his reindeer because every buck is deer to him. He puts bells on all his reindeer because their horns don’t work. On the way to delivering gifts, he lets his coursers stop at the Deery Queen. Dasher and Dancer love washing their meals down with coffee because they are Santa’s star bucks.
Santa has the right idea: Deliver your products free because they’re on the house. The fact that Santa works just one day a year is an inspiration to workers everywhere, but also explains why he gets paid only with cookies and milk.
When traveling in the sleigh in inclement weather, Santa gets icicles in his beard. Real chin chillas, those. He sometimes removes all the bells from his sleigh and travels silently through the night. One day, he hopes to win a No Bell prize.
What’s red and white and black all over? Santa Claus entering a home through a chimney. He loves sliding down chimneys because it soots him, but he actually has a fear of getting stuck. That fear is called Santa Claustrophobia. Since Santa has to go up and down a lot of chimneys on Christmas, he gets a yearly flue shot.
Whatever the obstacles, Santa always delivers his presents in the Saint Nick of time. Then on December 25, Santa is a beat Nick.
***
Here’s a message from Caroline McCullagh, of Clairemont, noted author of The Quest for the Ivory Caribou. As you can tell from her novel’s title, Caroline knows a thing or two about reindeer:
DEAR RICHARD: Q. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer? A. No, they already have names. Well, yes and no. They may have names, but they may not be the right names.
Most of the illustrations you see of Santa’s reindeer show them as having large and magnificent antlers. The truth is that male reindeer drop their antlers in November, when the competition for mating is over. Female reindeer, the only female deer to grow antlers, don’t lose their antlers until spring, after they have given birth. So all those reindeer shown with antlers on Christmas Eve are female, including Rudolph.
***
A closing thought about the war in Ukraine: “There is only one way in which one can endure man’s inhumanity to man, and that is to try, in one’s own life, to exemplify man’s humanity to man.” -Alan Paton