seymoure

My childhood memories of Christmas are shadows, dark and faded. It was only make memorable by the Movies and TV Specials. The child I was saw Christmas as something that happened on Television or to others. It was not a thing of families sharing.

For a long, long time it stayed that way. Birthdays and Christmas were things that passed me by, unheeded.

Then came a point where I decided that if there was going to be holiday in my life it would be something that must be built by the heart of those who wanted it.

We didn’t, starting out, have enough money to buy presents for all the friends we had. That wasn’t bad. We should make something that would give a part of us.

For several years we make wall hangings that were calendars. Every day was noted with something that happened then. Friends anniversaries or birthdays and after that historical moments of import. After that imaginary milestones - - The day Bilbo met Smaug for the first time, the day Peter Parker got bit by the radioactive spider, Aslan goes to the stone table, Bond gets his 00 rating. I did a lot of research for this and I was very proud of it. But more so for the monthly picture that rested above the month listing. Pam, Robin and I would split up the twelve months, with each of us taking 4 for ourselves. Robin would do drawings, Pam did photos and sometimes recipes, and I would do something weird. On the open squares of the month I would put puzzles or riddles. It was a glorious thing, something people would keep for long after the year was past.

Some years we would collect poetry or stories and publish our own little booklet for a present.

One year I had a special present for my daughter Robin. It was a Playhouse (cardboard, but beautiful) that would take up about a fifth of her bedroom. There was no way to put it together and still move it into her room. So I was going to have to assemble it in her bedroom as she slept. My mother-in-law, at that time not a Wayne fan at all, would have put down money that I was going to ruin the child's Christmas by waking her in the middle of the night and giving away the gift. But she had no idea some of the covert and clandinstine activities that had taken up my younger years. After all the family had taken to bed on Christmas Eve, and I was sure the child was actually asleep and not pretending, on the oft chance of seeing something she wasn't supposed to, I began. I can't tell you how long it took. When you are suspending time for each activity to make it possible to move so stealthfully that you are not only invisible but soundless, time vanishes also. But when I was done and Robin's Grandmother saw the play palace that awaited the child I think it was the first time I had impressed her. And the combination awe and giggling the coupled in my baby's discovery made everything that Christmas magic.
The greatest thing I created for Christmas, quite by accident, was the Treasure Hunt. Each year the Grandkidlings would follow clues to find something (often toy coins) and rush to get the next clue. At the end there was a prize for everyone who found everything. The adults joined in the hunt (and, I thing, the enjoyment) to the point that it has become a tradition that will outlast me.

So many wonderful memories. Like Robin and I taking her homemade brownies to all the people who had to work Christmas day. We would leave a name and address so they didn't have to worry that we were going to poison them. What did happen was that Robin got more than a few calls saying that those were the best brownies they had ever tasted. And one call I will always remember, a lady, in tears, saying, "I never knew Santa Cluas had a daughter. But I met her. She made me brownies and my Christmas!"
You all know my feeling about Santa. It remains so, even though operations have caused me to be physically unable to lift children onto my lap. I will always be Santa. When children would ask me how Santa got into their how when they didn’t have a chimney, or how fat old Santa could get through that tiny little shaft, I had the same answer. It was the answer when they asked how there could be so many Santas all over the place. How could they all be St. Nick? I’d tell them that Santa was the spirit of Christmas, and any time there was that spirit in their home Santa was already there. And anyone who had the spirit in their heart, they had a bit of Santa in them. So, when you give someone a present because of your Christmas love, then it came not just from you, but from Santa too, because you were a bit Santa.

One Christmas I was scheduled to do an early morning "Breakfast with Santa" and so, didn't have time to get there and dress. So I was going to have to get up, dress and drive there as Santa. I could tell you a half a dozen stories of Policemen who were more than a little non-plussed by the fact that they had pulled Santa over. But this one time, it was a morning after Robin had had a sleep over with her best friend Gina. The two of them had played very late and the sleeping had migrated out to the living room. It now intaled stepping over the kids to get to the front door. When Gina woke up I had to do something, so I turned to Pam, who stood in our bedroom door and just said, "Thanks Mrs. Owens" and left. I have always wondered if I might have scarred the child, but my wife tells me she really treated her with great respect after that.
So, you see, Christmas is a Palace we all live in only after we build it. When you can share some of your love, you are putting up the wall of the Christmas you are building.

May your Christmas Palace rise beautiful and strong for all time.

Merry Chirstmas.