Smudged letters on Christmas Eve

Santa is left handed in case you did not know.

A memory from my childhood came rushing back tonight as I watched my son put the star on top of the Christmas tree.

He reminded me of you and I felt drawn to put pen to paper.

You used to write me letters when I was a boy.

I’ve got them somewhere inside a shoebox way up high in the closet; where my children will never find them.

They are right next to the dirty letters Dad wrote to Mum when I was just a twinkle in his filthy eye. I’ve never read those letters Santa. Not since mum and dad both passed. I’m afraid of what I might find.

Your letters though Santa… Such merciless frivolity. Such mischief. Such adventure. Such joy.

You’d bitch about the neighbors. Talk shop and gossip about the nasty gifts some of my least favorite friends at school were going to get for Christmas (bad behavior) and sometimes you’d even delve into politics (random).

I’d always find myself nodding in agreement as Dad read out your letters.

I’m glad he read them out because your handwriting was always so messy, illegible almost. In fact you were always a downright filthy scoundrel in nearly every way.

You would spit the cherry stones out across the table, leave crumbs of cake half-eaten on her embroidered table cloth, and drops of brown liquor were laid to waste, water marking mum’s favorite table.

Of course this would make her downright furious.

A busy man with so little time. You blamed all your messiness on work and drinking too much.

I think you are lying about this.

I think you are left-handed like my father and that’s why you smudged the ink on those letters.

My son is also left-handed but you already know this, you’ve got his letters, you’ve seen the smudged ink. They say that the lefties are more prone to giftedness.

I hope you are going to be good to my Gabriel and Rose this Christmas, Santa. They deserve a magical Christmas.

I don’t know why I am thinking about all this shit on Christmas Eve Santa. I don’t know why I am finally writing to you after all these years of absolution.

I guess I am thinking a lot about the Christmas past and the joy you bought us all. There was something magical about you when I was a boy…

Something so mischievous.

Something darkly irreverent.

Something deeply kind.

And yet, I have to be honest with you Santa.

I was always very disappointed when I met you in shopping malls. You lacked the malice and the dark mischief that I sensed in your letters to me. You were like a pudgy bear when I sat in your knee. Staid, plain and boring.

I preferred the Santa I met in my letters. He was magical. He was mean and mad. He was filthy. He was alive.

God, I miss that Santa so much. He felt like a friend that I could trust.

That’s what I want more than anything this Christmas, Santa.

I want the old Santa back.

I want to wake up and find the cherry stones spat out across the table.

I want to find a dirty water mark laced across my wife’s favorite table.

I want to open the front door and nearly stumble into the largest reindeer shit I’ve ever seen.

I want my children to meet that Santa.

Please Santa. I have tears in my eyes, won’t you write me one more letter?

That’s what I want for Christmas.

I miss you so much.

Your son
Geoff. x