Asher meets the Santa monster

I swore I would not be one of those parents who pushes their kid to sit on Santa's lap.  I mean, the whole Santa thing is *for* the kids...supposedly...right?  So why in the name of a joyous season would I put a nervous child onto a strange man's lap when, let's face it, he's dressed bizarrely and to a toddler/preschooler, looks as likely to snack on him as to grant his wish for a present.  I asked Owen if he wanted to sit on Santa's lap at the mall, and it was a firm NO WAY.  Fine with me.  But then I found out there was a wonderfully quaint, free, community-supported Santa picture session at the very beautifully restored Victorian original library building.  I'd never been in there and wanted to see it, and I'd heard it was really a nice event.  So....off we went to see what it was.  It was lovely!  But Owen still wanted no part of sitting in Santa's lap.  I told him we'd just wait in line and watch the other kids and see how he felt when we got to the front.  Eventually I could tell he really did want to do it, and would feel sad if he chickened out, but didn't want to, if you know what I mean.  So I bribed him, and he did great and loved it.  The member of our party who I thought would be no problem, ahem, the social one, thought he was being adopted by a monster and might never see his family again.  So, I was *that* parent.  Sigh.  When we left the building, there were some dressed up cartoon characters outside where the line had formed, and Asher began crying on sight, thinking we were going to give him to one of them!  How awful.

 

At this point it may be no surprise that I'm not big on the whole believing-in-Santa thing.  I think it's nice as a story, and am not of the mind to ban Santa from Christmas, but why lie to kids to the extent that adults do?  Why not just explain it as a fun seasonal tradition and leave out the intentional deception.  Reuel is a bit more sentimental about the experience than that, so I feel I am treading always a shaky tightrope of trying not to offend Reuel's Christmas sensibilities, while not feeling totally disgusting with myself and parenting against my own.  Ugh!  So far, I just choose my words very carefully and let Owen draw his own conclusions.  I've decided the most sensible answer is probably not getting too concerned about it either way as long as we focus on keeping the real meaning of Christmas at the center of our celebration.