It’s Week 20 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge and the topic is “Bearded.”
Because few of my ancestors and relatives had beards, I chose to write about Santa. This was supposed to be a cheerful, nostalgic narrative about LaViolet family Christmases. My mother shared all her Christmas memories with me. I did plan to write about them, however I became distracted when searching for pictures. I wanted to add one of Santa with my mom, aunt, and uncles. You’d think this would be an easy task – the kids with Santa. I figured I’d find at least a few pictures.
I only managed to find this one:
I’m sure you now understand why my plans for this post were derailed. This Santa-and-kids picture doesn’t pair with the story I intended to tell. Not at all. It’s horrifying!
Grampy Phil captioned this “Merry Christmas!” A better caption is “Scary Christmas!” Holy shit! What kind of nightmarish hellscape did this Santa crawl out of?
Seriously, I have so many questions! Was this a neighbor? A relative? What was this monstrosity doing in my grandparents’ house? Why did they allow it near their children?
Why is his face all melty?
Why aren’t they running away?!?!?!
Everyone looks so happy, except for my Uncle Gary, who was probably too young to know what was going on, and my Uncle Steve. He’s the only one with enough self-preservation to look uncomfortable. Notice he’s standing as far away from Santa as possible while still remaining in the picture? I’m surprised he grew up to enjoy Stephen King novels after this unholy holiday visit. This Santa could be one of the incantations of IT! Maybe he slithered out of the sewer into their living room. All he needs is a fistful of balloons.
Remember that old, Saturday Night Live Church Lady Christmas skit? The one where she has S-A-N-T-A spelled out on a board, only to rearrange the letters? “Could it be……SATAN?” Church Lady was clearly onto something!
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