I had dinner with my daughter yesterday. She now knows this blog exists but isnt sure she wants to read it. I can’t blame her. TL:DR, right?
Seriously though, as the clock ticks down, I recognize that I have lived a life that has been profoundly out of step with my time.
too late or still too soon...
For sure that’s true but ironically, it may turn out that I will be seen by progeny and history as an unsympathetic, even despicable character. There is certainly enough there to condemn me for all time.
That said, I am reminded of a story that I revisit from time to time:
When I was four, Santa Claus came to my preschool, sat down in a chair, told us a story and then gave us all thoughtful gifts. I can still recall that I got Spiderman colorforms. It was as awesome as it sounds.
I was so happy about the experience that I told my family at dinner.
[INT – Dining Room]
DAD: That was not Santa Claus, that was Mr.Peters”
ADULT ME (V.O): Now Mr.Peters owned the preschool and ran it with his wife, Mrs. Peters. I knew him very well. Santa Claus was not Mr.Peters
KID ME: Dad, I saw Santa Claus with my own eyes. I swear .
DAD: You just don’t understand what you saw. There is no Santa Claus. Your mother and I buy all the presents and you should be more thankful and less self-centered. Honestly, you need to recognize that Santa Claus is just a social construct to encourage generosity, but you kids these days are all so entitled that you miss the point entirely.
ADULT ME (V.O): I looked around at the hard eyes of my older brother and mother. My truculent brother always talked back to Dad and my too clever mother always used rhetorical trucks to undermine and humiliate my Dad. Now, in this time when they could use their powers to defend Santa Claus, both were silent. My Dad had said an inarguable truth, to which there was simply nothing to say.
[end scene]
What a revelation to have! The tremendous power of the truth, it will silence all critics! Then what followed was the further realization that my father used the truth out of a spiteful jealousy of my enthusiasm for a gift given to me that he felt was useless and somehow harmful to my moral development. Dad watched the hurt sink in and then turned his attention to cleaning his plate with voracious zeal; adding the rare compliment for my Mom’s excellent cooking. The topic turned to boring adult stuff and soon I was excused
Soon I realized that I was surrounded by fools. By the time I got to elementary school, I could count on two fingers the people smarter than I. The rest were delusional in their ignorance. They couldn’t name the nine planets. They couldn’t count to a million. They didn’t know the rules to Chess or contract bridge. They hadn’t watched “I, Claudius”. Their parents voted for Reagan. But the most obnoxious evidence was that despite it being an obvious lie, they all believed in Santa Claus.
In first grade, we saw the Rockettes Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music call . On the bus ride home, they got excited because on every corner, they saw a Salvation Army worker dressed in a Santa Suit. Each one was the real Santa to those fools. They didn’t appreciate being called fools and told on me. When the teacher came to yell at me and I calmly said, “Teacher, explain to these fools that there is no such thing as Santa”
“What ever do you mean?” asked my first grade teacher, who exchanged looks with the other teachers that I now understand to be side-eye. Another teacher added, “Of course there is Santa Claus. Why would you say such a hurtful thing in front of all your friends?”
“How dare you! My mom is a teacher, like you, and she swore to teach facts. You are a disgrace to the profession.”
Silence. I had done it! I had done just like my Dad. Like Mozart, I must be a prodigy.
…
I was left alone for the rest of the bus ride to savor the victory. For some reason, however, my first grade teacher was noticeably tougher on me after that. Also: somehow, I was the only student who she forgot to give a cupcake to on my birthday. Maybe because it was in June.
I recall that in second grade, I wished someone a happy birthday at their party with “So now that you are 7, you are old enough to recognize the truth of their being no Santa Claus.”
Was this the only thing? No. I was blessed with the physique and aggression enough to seek fistfights as a way of silencing criticism. And I was emotionally dysregulated enough to emulate my father and get combative on small triggers. And callous enough to retaliate against being called rascist names by making fun of the fact that some kids had alcoholic parents who neglected them. And just in general, leaning into a taste for ad hominem attack. Morally, it was not only correct but required that people ought to be yelled at for their frequently concurren stupidity, cruelty, and vainity.
Did all of that start before the Santa Claus incident? Hard to imagine a three year old misanthrope, but it would also be unfair and comically reductive to say this all happened because my Dad ruined the myth of Santa.
What is more accurate to say that this sort of fundamental misunderstanding by my parents of what is an age appropriate conversations to have with your children was the norm. The Santa debunking was a dramatic trauma thing that has a clean narrative arc and can lead to many moral lessons, but it’s hardly an isolated example.
All this is a long way of saying that I have often found myself out of step with my age group cohort and with the zeitgeist. So, I speculate that history will not vindicate me, but rather will condemn me further. If the stupid majority has hegemonic influence over the narrative now, then surely they will write history.
“But think of the children! Can’t they tell a different story?”
They could if there was one. Part of my musing is that even in writing my own history, I grade myself something like a C- for “Not repeating the terrible things your parents did.” Such that the most generous version I can muster is that “Here lay a man who realized that, for his children’s sake that he ought to go against his own bad habits and self-destructive learned behaviors, and about 71% of the time was able to do so. C-“
...All my darkest hours talking like this... 