Santa's Eyes, Their Watching You Part I: A Lesson Unlearned

Before anyone gets snippy about plaigarizing the great talent of Hall & Oates, I would like to point out that this is (not) from the secret collaboration of Oates, Mussina, Garfunkel & Lisa Simpson hereto be known as the Christmas Basement Tapes (containing such chart ploppers as Reindeer Eater, Your Kiss Is On My Christmas List, & the aforementioned Santa's Eyes Their Watching You). Why was it recorded in a basement you ask? Well, there was no room at the Hotel, the Motel, or the Holiday Inn. But that is besides the point. I just want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas...the Jews, the Hindus, the Muslims, the Buddhists, the Martial Artists, and especially the Rastafarians...And of course anyone else who is alive and breathing. Not because I am trying to offend anyone but because for Christians, saying Merry Christmas isn't about pushing a religious belief on someone else. At least it shouldn't be. To me it is saying, be good my brother. We are all in this world together and at this time of year we should remember that fact. One Love. One Race, the human race...That being said, I'd like to make a 180 degree turn and talk about something else. Pretty typical because I don't like to stick to one topic. I get bored easily. Blame TV and second hand marijuan smoke. Cough. Cough. I did not exhale. Anyway, my wife likes to say that I have adult ADD but to my friends and family who have known me my whole life; well, they know I am just sort of "special".

With all the talk of domestic spying, the Patriot Act and general paranoia, I was reminded of the OG of spying and compilations of intelligence data. Santa Claus or as I used to spell it, Santa Claws. As a kid I had a definite healthy respect for the Fat Man but it was tinged with an "oh so real' impression that he was sort of the right hand of the law or as me & my brothers called them, "Mom & Dad". However these real fears were also a demonstration of a certain innocence. An innocence that I wish I could see in all people and as Big Audio Dynamite once crooned, "I wish I could have seen you when you could run wild... I would've liked to know you as an innocent child, innocent child". Like most people, the past seems in retrospect like it was a simpler time. A better time...but occasionally things happen and my memory is triggered and I remember things as they truly were.

In my house at Christmas time, the Advent season brought a pre-Santa visitor into our house every year. His name was Elfy. Apparently, and according to my parents, Elfy was an agent of Mr. Ho Ho Ho dispatched to our specific home with the intent of compiling data of the naughty and nice variety. A spy if you will, the size and dimensions of your average run of the mill stuffed animal with the same constitution. Every day, he would appear in a different place just slightly out of my young arms reach. One day, he'd be in the kitchen checking to see if we had the nads to try and take a unauthorized cookie or a non-requisitioned sandwich between meals (a definite violation of the Treaty of Mealtime Hungriness Act of 1982). The next day he'd be in the family room to view any non-homework related television viewing or even worse the naughtiest of naughty transgressions...the playing of video games during a pre-designated quiet time. My brothers being a little older, showed no fear of Elfy and as latch key kids they flouted the rules and said to hell with Santa. Of course to get on Santa's good side I used this counter intelligence to my advantage. To avoid my brother's sure and systematic revenge (which rarely consisted of armed aggression, more psychological terror like the silent treatment for a month or the ever popular invasion and eventual plunder of my stuff. Me:"Hey, that's mine. I got it for my birthday this year." Them: "No you didn't. I did. Maybe they'll get it for you next year."), I would simply give the info to Elfy instead of the more authoritarian vestige of my parents. My bro's didn't seem to mind and it kept the status quo as far as I was concerned. This was the good time.

The year was 1984 an Orwellian year as far as I am concerned because it was the first year that I began to question the veracity of the Man in the Big Red Hat. His little toy making CIA (or Claus Intelligence Agency) agent reappeared right after a Thanksgiving dinner that could not be beat as Arlo Guthrie is fond of saying. Later on that same week in a completely unprovoked act of aggression my siblings scheduled a fight for me with one of their friends brothers who was around the same age. Few punches were exchanged but some tears were shared by me and this similarly duped kid who had no malice in his heart...the fight was made to go on until one of us went down. I technically won the fight but because I didn't show the eye of the Tiger, I was deemed unfit of the name my father gave me. It was determined by the ring masters that I needed to be hardened. It was decided by them that Santa must die. Upon arriving home that day I was led to the attic where to my astonishment there was a myriad of presents, some wrapped and some unwrapped. Subsequently it had been explained to me that a clever ruse had been held at my expense. I was told to grow up and be a man...Due to their generally distasteful behavior I remained skeptical. Mom and Dad had never lied to me and yet my brothers had lied to me repeatedly over the course of my brief life. Secretly I explained away the harrowing anti-lesson I had been taught that day but deep down inside I knew they were right...but I tried to convince myself that it wasn't true...

To be continued Tomorrow: Santa's Eyes, Their Watching You Part II: Elfy's Revenge