By the fourth grade I should have known better. I should have known that I was going to take my lumps for hanging onto Santa Claus the way I did but, damn, I’m nothing if not dogged in my point of view and that pretty much brings up another associated problem at the time.
My dog was involved in the entire mythology of Santa and if I was going to still believe in Santa I was also going to have to buy into Santa’s otherworldly ability to talk to animals and that meant accepting my dad’s (father #2) assertion that my German Shepherd, Pal, spoke to Santa about me often and that I should consider that in any future behavior.
For me, the behavioral issue was no big deal but the fact that my dog spoke to Santa was a really attractive possibility and something I wanted to be true because it was cool and gave me new found respect for Pal. On television there was Mr. Ed (the talking horse) communicating with his owner, Wilbur, but this thing with Pal was the real deal and I wasn’t afraid to share it.
And, of course, I was met with resistance from two principle sources.
First, there was fourth grade classmate, Eugene, who took great umbrage with my story, feeling it necessary to debunk Santa and my dog all in one fell swoop. This only strengthened my resolve to stand behind my reality because it had to be true and the only way to cement that truth was to sell it with all the conviction I could muster. So, I sold it, sold it and sold it some more until Eugene threatened to beat me up if I kept on, which created an immediate impasse and an end to all future discussions.
Hell with it, I’d keep it to myself.
But I didn’t, because the next day at my babysitter’s house (I stayed there during the day when my parents were at work), I let loose with the same story and everyone involved said, in other words, that I was full of shit. “Your dog can’t talk to Santa Claus!”, said her son, Glenn. “Yes he can…my dad told me”, said I, and so we went around and around until Glenn’s mother sided with her son and confirmed that dogs couldn’t talk to people and my dad was just telling a tale.
Now, here’s exactly what I thought and felt during all of this and I still feel pretty much the same way.
Intellectually, it seemed like a monstrous long-shot that my dog could talk to Santa Claus but I wanted to believe it, I was 9 years old and, obviously, wanted to suck every last ounce out of the legend before dull reality set in. The talking dog aspect fit the paradigm perfectly. Santa was already talking to his reindeer and they all seemed to understand what he was talking about so what would be far-fetched about Santa talking to dogs? This is Santa, and Santa carries with him some serious magic mojo so it was all working for me. If I believed in Santa, I’d have to believe that he could talk to my dog.
Now you expect kids your own age to be a little brutal with their righteous truth and I could forgive that but when Glenn’s mother and other family members, as a group, shot down my story I thought, what a bunch of assholes, ripping the illusionary joy right out of my head because they had to be right.
I don’t know why someone would do that to a 9 year-old but I do know that, unlike today’s ‘fast-lane’ kids, there’s no reason to make a mad dash for the mediocrity and very un-magical reality that is adulthood. In fact, if I could put my knowledge on hold and buy into that whole Santa thing again, I’d do it in a heartbeat.