In Christmas ’77, when I was 5, my mum took my little sister and I to Morley’s in Brixton to see Father Christmas for the first time. Also with us were my aunt and my two older cousins. When it came to my turn, I remember approaching Father Christmas a little warily. Now I can’t recall if I climbed onto his lap or not, but I do remember him telling me he was just going away and would be back shortly. And as he left, I decided to peer through this letter box which was at his side, and I’m assuming that was so kids could post their letters to Father Christmas.
Now thinking about it, because of what I saw once I peered through this letterbox, this must’ve been built into a wall or a portable screen, because when I looked through, I saw this Father Christmas remove his hat and beard, talking to other colleagues behind this screen, and he was completely bald. He lit up a fag, and I was gob smacked. And I think I told everyone there, I was in a frenzy, but my mum calmed me down as the guy returned and gave me packet of cowboy and Indian figures which were all the rage for kids of my generation.
But this incident still didn’t destroy my faith in Father Christmas and I think when I started Secondary school, I still believed in him, or at least wanted to believe in him.
And every year, probably til I was at least 12, despite my mum’s inability to hide presents properly, which I kept spotting in wardrobes, I think I still clung onto the belief that he was real. And I always planned, but always fell asleep, to get up in the early hours if Christmas Day, hide behind the front room sofa and wait for him to turn up thinking I would be able to talk my way into riding in his sleigh for some of the night. But he never did show up.
So in the final year of still believing in him, I prepared a questionnaire for Father Christmas, left it on our marble green coloured second hand table which we’d got from my aunt – we always got my aunt’s cast offs – and a selection of those viscount mint filling biscuits with the green foil wrapping because I figured he’d be hungry.
I woke up in the morning to find the questionnaire had been filled out, and the handwriting was identical to my dad’s. My dad just couldn’t be bothered to even attempt to disguise his handwriting. I was crushed.