Dad on Duty #126 – Christmas!

A couple of weeks ago, I played the part of Santa for the school play. 

I was kinda voluntold.  When approached, by both the music & art teachers….for whom I have a real soft spot…….it *sounded* like I’d be a prop, basically.  Wear the suit, wave, smile.  I thought. 

They elected not to enlighten me otherwise until I was committed.

Instead, I had actual *lines*.  Several of them. I had more lines in the play than anyone other than the rapping second grader (who was *awesome*).

I was really quite nervous about it.  I rehearsed my lines *a lot*.  I was driving my family crazy.

Leslie ordered a suit for Santa.  It was very good.  But, it was a little too well tailored.  An odd problem.  Let me explain. 

My actual body shape is quite Santa-like.  There’s plenty of belly here to work with.  But the Santa suit was oddly flattering and made my belly pretty much go away.  So when I tried it on a few days before the play, and walked out into the office area to show the admin staff, the ladies there were like “uh….no…..that’s not gonna work”.  I looked like Orange Theory Santa.  Like Santa was about to fight crime. 

So I figured out how to stuff pillows in there.  The trick is, while moving around and saying “ho, ho, HO” many times, and gesticulating Santa-like, you don’t want the pillows to drop to your crotch or shift around to your butt.  That gets awkward. 

Now it’s show time.  There were a LOT of people coming to see us. 

The suit worked fine, and I remembered my lines, and the kids were AMAZING in the play.  All was well.

Ho, ho, ho. 

******

The next day was our Christmas party day at school. 

It is the perfect storm for adult exhaustion; the kids are hopped up on sugar, there are lots of games and other distractions, and the impending arrival of the biggest holiday of the year adds just the right spark for a conflagration.  Trying to maintain any level of discipline is a bit challenging.

As a group, Kindergarten had a big party which devolved into a general melee.  Total chaos. 

Afterwards, I check with each teacher to make sure she has, more or less, the same number of kids she started with this morning, in more or less the same condition.

Ms Allen’s response to my query of “you ok?”:  “yeah, if you mean other than I started my day at 8 am with a full blown rager populated by little people…..yeah, other than that, I guess I’m ok….”

I’m thinking that’s a “no”……I should check on her again soon……

********

It is now lunchtime, and we are trying to get the little babies, the pre-school kids with development challenges, out the door from the cafeteria to the playground. 

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They are not having any of it. 

There are only eight of them today.  And, counting me, we have four adults.  That’s a 1:2 ratio.  This should work.

Well, I got news for you.  It, in fact, DID NOT. 

One by one, the littles collapsed or made a break for it.  Within 20 feet of the cafeteria door, we now have four kids lying and/or squirming on the floor, and two others pinned….barely….against the wall by an outstretched adult hand to keep them from escaping.  There are no adults left.  It’s a civil war battlefield scene. 

Regular Pre-K and kindergarten are now trying to depart via this same pathway, just behind us.  It’s like those documentaries you’ve seen of people trying to climb Mount Everest when they have a traffic jam; there are bodies on the ground, to both sides and in the middle of the pathway, while the next group is trying to advance.

And it was pretty much the same outcome as Everest.  Not good.

I finally just start shouting behind me to the KG teachers “just go around us!  Go around!”

We can only hope they come back for us before it’s too late.

*******

I forgot how hard it is to put a glove….not a mitten, but an actual 5-finger glove, on a small child.

Oh.  My.   Lord. 

A KG-er walks up to me and presents his left glove, followed by his left hand, and asks “can you please get this on me?”

Sure. 

Eight and a half minutes later, I have his thumb and ring finger in the same hole, and his pinky is somehow sticking out into the open air. 

I’m now checking his backpack in the hope he has a bottle of Scotch in here somewhere.

*********

All the kids who were in the Christmas play knew I had been the one playing Santa.  Dozens of times today, while walking around in DOD uniform, kids would say “Hi Santa!”.  They were very proud of themselves for knowing some inside intel.

But they also seemed a little closer, a little more comfortable with me.  It’s as if the Santa suit had left a little magic on me, that made them want to hug me (Santa).

And hug they did.  Even more than usual. 

Santa is real.  He is the spirit that makes children smile, and feel safe, and able to express love.  That is Santa.

And today, just a little bit,

          I was Santa.

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