Here comes Santa Claus……

The Santa visit.  For the uninitiated, a wondrous holiday event where children can believe in the miracle of Santa and his flying reindeer.  An place, singletons  imagine, at some future date where they will take their perfectly groomed and behaved children and experience the wonder of watching their cherubic offspring tell Jolly old St. Nicholas their Christmas wishes.

Now, if everyone can put down their hallucinogen of choice we can get to what the Santa visit is really like.  While there are Bank Santas, Library Santas, Restaurant Santas and even Gas Station Santas, the most well known Santa, I think we can agree, is the Santa at the Mall.

This seemingly benign Santa is also the one who’s annual appearance strikes fear into the hearts of every veteran parent.  It is here you always get stuck behind the newborn dressed up in an outfit so ornate and intense it gives you hives just to look at it.  This child is accompanied by at least two adults who have saccharine sweet smiles and seem immune to the pack of rabid parents in line behind them.  Listen newbies, the kid is asleep – prop her up , snap the picture and get the hell out of our way.

Behind you is always the 5 year old dressed up in the winter equivalent of the seer sucker suit.  This is the kid that spends 45 minutes jumping up and down while his mother feeds him Mrs. Fields cookies and repeats over and over.. “Little Johnny we need to use our inside voices right now.”   Always key here is knowing when to place a safe distance between yourself and Little Johnny. This would be  just before he slips into a diabetic coma and channels Linda Blair in the exorcist.  Someone call the janitorial staff – Little Johnny just exorcised the demon and needs to get out of this line. Cleanup on aisle 4. You think I’m making this stuff up.

To make matters worse, the Shopping Mall Santa is always strategically placed right in the exact middle of the mall – so you are forced to trudge through a major department store and probably some type of food court just to reach the “North Pole.”  All the while you try to keep a hand on your kid that is alternating whines of Im hungry with the tactic of “you may have my hand but if I just drop to the ground right here in front of the ice cream store what are you going to do about it” routine.  Do not be a fool.  Do not stop to buy a little treat for that kid – please reference Little Johnny in previous paragraph.

Parents, I am trying to save you here. I have been in these lines and waited for the moment my kids will all crowd around Santa and have that magical moment.  Here’s the reality.  By the time you  get to the front of the line after waiting for over 2 hours, you are all overheated, tired, need a bathroom break and the kids all look like refugees from a third world adventure park.   Santa himself is ready to hitch a ride on Rudolph and get the hell out of there and the elf taking the picture has had to place themselves on the naughty list for language unbecoming a whimsical character.

Now, because I am never one to start one of these diatribes without a solution – here we go.  The way I see it you have two options.  First – just say no.  Kids, Santa is a magical creature – he knows when you’re sleeping and he knows when you’re awake.  Tell Alexa to send him a message and move on.  If you insist on the photo op – spend a few bucks and go get a life size Kris Kringle cutout.  Buy the kids some cookies – tell them to fake it till they make it – smile, snap and call it a day.