{"id":11170,"date":"2017-12-22T12:29:06","date_gmt":"2017-12-22T17:29:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/?p=11170"},"modified":"2017-12-22T12:31:47","modified_gmt":"2017-12-22T17:31:47","slug":"confessions-of-a-one-season-santa-wsj","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2017\/12\/22\/confessions-of-a-one-season-santa-wsj\/","title":{"rendered":"Confessions of a One Season Santa – WSJ"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>In my wayward youth, I worked one season as a Santa Claus at a Filene’s Department Store in Boston.\u00a0\u00a0I wrote up that escapade for the Wall Street Journal<\/strong> in 2011.\u00a0 This piece is an outtake from Public Policy Hooligan<\/a> – which includes some other details of that gig not fit for a family newspaper.<\/p>\n

The \u00a0illustration to the left was not used in WSJ.\u00a0 It was created by Tom Blanton<\/strong>, the mastermind of the Project for a New American Revolution.<\/a><\/p>\n

Wall Street Journal<\/a>,<\/strong> December 22, 2011<\/p>\n

Confessions of a One-Season Santa Claus<\/strong>
\nby James Bovard<\/p>\n

In the fall of 1977, I moved to Boston seeking literary triumphs and intellectual stimulation. As a 21-year-old college dropout from the mountains of Virginia who had just sold his first article, I assumed I could easily rack up more sales in the big city. But my submissions struck out everywhere, and the financial wolves were soon howling at my door. After seeking refuge in the Boston Globe\u2019s Help Wanted ads, I found myself front and center at a Santa Claus prep session run by the Western Temporary Services.<\/p>\n

After completing the 28-minute training program, I was dispatched to a Filene\u2019s department store in the distant south suburbs where I met the Boss Lady from Hell. She looked me over, grimaced, snorted and growled: \u201cI hope you\u2019re not like those Santas that damn temp agency sent last year.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy? What\u2019d they do?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first one was a drunk who would sneak into the bathroom and hit his flask and then drool on kids while slurring the names of his reindeer. The second pranced around like he was Peter Pan. The third was the worst\u2014he seemed perfectly normal till he dropped trousers with a hundred kids watching.\u201d<\/p>\n

I made a note to double check the belt on the Santa outfit.<\/p>\n

Boss Lady greeted me every day with the traditional Boston \u201cHowahya? . . . LISTEN!!! I don\u2019t like the way your hair looks under the wig! And I thought I told you to shave that red beard. And don\u2019t be snacking while you\u2019re on the job. Now, get out there and look jolly.\u201d<\/p>\n

I worked as a restaurant Santa, circling the dining room and visiting families as they munched their mediocre cuisine. After getting kids to recite their Christmas<\/span><\/span> gift wish list, I handed them a little bag of goodies. It was holy writ to never promise that a child would receive a specific gift, else Filene\u2019s would suffer the parents\u2019 undying wrath.<\/p>\n

This was my first and only experience being a minor deity. As I approached, some kids would jump up and down in their seats, and if there were two or more children at the same table they often had shouting contests.<\/p>\n

But not all the children treasured their visit with Santa.<\/p>\n

I walked up to one agitated 4-year old, blond-haired girl hunkered down in her chair and clutching the arm rests like a life raft. When I leaned over and asked what she wanted for Christmas<\/span><\/span>, she gritted her teeth: \u201cI want you to leave.\u201d<\/p>\n

One evening, I saw a dark-eyed, dark-haired, 7-year-old boy standing in the entrance staring at me like he\u2019d seen a ghost. I stopped and gave him the biggest grin of the night. \u201cSanta, you have a weird laugh,\u201d he sputtered as he clung to his mother\u2019s skirt.<\/p>\n

The boy had a point. My laugh has always been rambunctious and it became rowdier when I occasionally slammed down a beer or two before commencing Claus work. It wasn\u2019t my fault that the happy hour at the nearby pub commenced just before my shift started. The same laugh that spooked some young Bostonians got me ejected almost 20 years later from the Supreme Court press box.<\/p>\n

Toward the end of my final night on the job, the high-strung assistant restaurant manager\u2014who had almost fired me the previous night after she caught me poaching a piece of apple pie\u2014signaled to follow her to the soda fountain section of the restaurant, far from the prevailing hubbub, for a special guest. As I readied the jollity, Boss Lady Jr. tapped me on the shoulder: \u201cThe little girl is blind.\u201d<\/p>\n

There sat<\/span><\/span> two of the most tranquil people I had seen the entire holiday season. The mother was resting her left hand lightly on her daughter\u2019s shoulder. The little girl looked to be 6 or 7 years old, with light brown hair and a gentle smile that bloomed across her face when her mom announced, \u201cAnd here comes Santa Claus.\u201d<\/p>\n

I encouraged the girl to touch the fake Santa beard. Unlike some kids, she did not attempt to yank it off as if she were capturing the enemy\u2019s flag.<\/p>\n

I have forgotten what she requested for Christmas<\/span><\/span>, but it was reasonable. She didn\u2019t ask for a pony and a French au pair and every Barbie doll and accessory produced since 1957.<\/p>\n

Speaking softly, I described some of the Christmas<\/span><\/span> decorations in the restaurant. She seemed to enjoy my comments, so I rattled on about the meaning of Christmas<\/span><\/span>. I had seen a lot of warmth between parents and children that season, but the bond between this mother and daughter was more precious than any other. There was such a radiance from her mother\u2019s love, I knew that girl would have a wonderful Christmas<\/span><\/span>.<\/p>\n

Visiting with that mother and daughter rejuvenated my holiday spirit in a way that a bowl of spiked egg nog never could. In later decades, when the Christmas<\/span><\/span> season sometimes seemed burdensome or hollow, thinking back on that pair has helped put a sparkle back in my eyes. And I count my blessings that I no longer have to don a garish suit, false whiskers and a stuffed pillow to rake in $3.50 an hour frightening children with my laugh.<\/p>\n

Excerpted from Public Policy Hooligan <\/a>\u2013 available on Kindle here<\/a> \u2013\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In my wayward youth, I worked one season as a Santa Claus at a Filene’s Department Store in Boston.\u00a0\u00a0I wrote up that escapade for the Wall Street Journal in 2011.\u00a0 This piece is an outtake from Public Policy Hooligan – which includes some other details of that gig not fit for a family newspaper. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11174,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[144,527,123,186,636,1286],"class_list":["post-11170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-boston","tag-memoir","tag-public-policy-hooligan","tag-santa-claus","tag-wall-street-journal","tag-weird-laugh"],"yoast_head":"\nConfessions of a One Season Santa - WSJ - James Bovard<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Here's the story of my gig as a Santa Claus in Boston, reposted from a 2011 Wall Street Journal piece. 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For a zestier version of this story, see Public Policy Hooligan.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2017\/12\/22\/confessions-of-a-one-season-santa-wsj\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2017\/12\/22\/confessions-of-a-one-season-santa-wsj\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2017\/12\/22\/confessions-of-a-one-season-santa-wsj\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/jpb-blanton-face3-less-red-santajim_edited-2-SHRUNK-FOR-BLOG-SNIPPET.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/jpb-blanton-face3-less-red-santajim_edited-2-SHRUNK-FOR-BLOG-SNIPPET.jpg","width":470,"height":313},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/2017\/12\/22\/confessions-of-a-one-season-santa-wsj\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Confessions of a One Season Santa – WSJ"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/","name":"James Bovard","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/79550830ad81c14be529a2c37469974f","name":"Jim","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d95466cfd0934e38803c5035629df727ae4ec1f3f96c6883c05b5c52e2044505?s=96&d=mm&r=r","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d95466cfd0934e38803c5035629df727ae4ec1f3f96c6883c05b5c52e2044505?s=96&d=mm&r=r","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d95466cfd0934e38803c5035629df727ae4ec1f3f96c6883c05b5c52e2044505?s=96&d=mm&r=r","caption":"Jim"},"description":"Bovard's homepage is at http:\/\/www.jimbovard.com He can be contacted at jim@jimbovard.com James Bovard is the author of ten books. The Wall Street Journal called Bovard \"the roving inspector general of the modern state\" and Washington Post columnist George Will called him a \"one-man truth squad.\" His 1994 book, Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty, received the Free Press Association\u2019s Mencken Award as Book of the Year. His Terrorism & Tyranny won the Lysander Spooner \"Best Book on Liberty in 2003\" award. He received the Thomas Szasz Award for Civil Liberties work, awarded by the Center for Independent Thought and the Freedom Fund Award from the Firearms Civil Rights Defense Fund of the National Rifle Association. Bovard\u2019s writings have been publicly denounced by FBI director Louis Freeh, the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, the Postmaster General, and the chiefs of the U.S. International Trade Commission, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, as well as by many congressmen and other malcontents.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.jimbovard.com","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/jim.bovard","https:\/\/x.com\/jimbovard"],"url":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/author\/admin\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11170"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11175,"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11170\/revisions\/11175"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimbovard.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}