“Real” Christmas skits and “bond fires”

Mark Krueger

Christmas was not much fun in residential treatment. For many of the kids, and us, it was a sad and stressful time. The “holidays” stirred up many memories of disappointment, abuse, and neglect. The families they came from did not “have it together” before, during or after the holidays. Their inadequacy was heightened when the kids saw marketing that showed “make believe” families having a good time. Happy ending movies like A White Christmas and It’s a Wonderful Life seemed to be shown repeatedly. I was not much of a TV watcher, much to the chagrin of some of the boys, but all of them seemed to have seen these movies and think they were real.

Not all the kids were Christian. Some never had a Christmas. Still the sadness and anxiety seemed to be contagious. “The group was even higher than usual,” we used to say. This was understandable. Some of us had our own experiences of disappointment with the holidays.

Nonetheless we tried to make the most of it. We felt maybe, if they experienced a good Christmas with us, at least they would have had that experience. My colleagues and I were never quite sure if it was worth it. We would spend extra time and take extra care to make sure they all had gifts of equal substance based on their tastes and interests. I never liked shopping so this was not exactly something I wanted to do. I like the gifts of everyday life more than gifts bought under pressure to find something somebody might like. The best gifts seem to appear in the course of human interaction.

We understood what the kids and we were in for as Christmas approached. We tried to be more engaged in activities than usual and to keep things “normal,” whatever that was. As it got closer we would decorate the center with them and try to keep the TVs off so they did not see too much of the superficial, Christmas stuff, and get their hopes up of living in a world that did not exist.

As I said a moment ago, many of us (the workers) had our own mixed feelings about the holidays. It was probably most difficult for the workers who had fond memories of Christmas because they were the most likely to be disappointed. I think the rest of us more or less preferred to get it over with and to get back to our own sense of normal. Maybe we had a twinge of hope that it would turn out well.

I felt that way, mixed. As a boy, it had taken me a while to get used to the idea that there was no Santa Claus and I think, once I did, I was happier. Santa came to our house on Christmas Eve around dinner time. We were early on his route. At dusk, my brother and I would take a short nap with one eye open. My father would go up into the attic and stamp his feet so we would think we heard reindeer on the roof. The anticipation and excitement were almost unbearable.

Sometimes however there were no reindeer. My father like many fathers went to the Christmas party at work, and sometimes out to the bars afterwards. So you were never sure if he would show up, and if he did show up, you wouldn’t know what kind of condition he or the reindeer would be in. In hindsight, you could almost tell by the tap dance of feet what kind of condition he was in.

This uncertainty about Christmas gave me some empathy I think for the boys. While I had not experienced their abuse and neglect (I had some semblance of a normal family within the range in which dysfunctional normal families exist), I could relate to what it meant to get your hopes up and be disappointed. I had fallen at times into the trap of believing the programs I heard on the radio, when they counted down the days to the arrival of Santa Claus and told us to be good so we wouldn't get coal in our stockings. The absence of my father was in a sense, the coal in my stocking. Before they were placed with us at the treatment center the boys I worked with, if they were lucky enough to have stockings, had much bigger chunks of coal.

A major event at the treatment center was the Christmas dinner party with skits performed by the boys and workers. Afterwards some of the boys would “get to go home” while others stayed behind with us for a quiet Christmas Eve and Day. Even though they would never admit it, I think the boys who stayed behind had the better deal. I preferred myself to be there with a few of them on a quiet Christmas day. We would have a nice breakfast together in the living room and then have a day of activity together: table games, maybe some hoops, then dinner and maybe a movie together about something other than Christmas. And then the next day it was life as usual, at least until the other boys returned from their visits, high with disappointment. If you've worked in residential care you know, or at least can imagine, that for many of them it was much worse than not having the reindeer show up.

The Christmas skits were often much better, or more real, than anything in the movies or on TV. Despite our best plans they would almost always break down into fights or arguments, or steadfast resistance to go on stage. Maybe the kids didn’t get it, but we did: they were playing out It’s a Wonderful Life with endings that were not only better drama, but also much more real. They turned our “feel good skits” into skits that forced us to hear and see them for who they were. Like a good movie or play, the skits hit home and rang true to their real worlds. And in some ways I think this is why I liked Child and Youth Care – the “realness” of it. Often today I think we probably should have listened more to what they were trying to show and tell us about the meanings of holidays for them.

It took me a long time to stop believing in Santa Claus. I kept trying to make up for the days when the reindeer didn’t show. It never really worked. Even when we had a “good” gathering around the holidays, I always had this sinking feeling afterwards.Too much drinking and superficiality – the gifts never really meant as much as we wanted them to mean. Things were said or not said, left over like a casserole of words for the days that followed.

One year Suzanne, our son Jason, and I stayed home and exchanged handmade, instead of bought, gifts. That meant something. Now we pretty much downplay Christmas and wait for it to pass. Sometimes we barely acknowledge its presence. I prefer Thanksgiving when the extended family gets together, has a good meal and goes home. I’d like to think this would be a better running holiday for kids in residential treatment as well, a good meal together several times a year.

Personally I always preferred the happenings, or events that spontaneously turned out to be good times or celebrations, the unscripted events that emerged from life struggles and efforts to relate to others: a canoe trip, a game of three on three basketball, or after a pleasant dinner, a quiet evening watching a good movie together and eating popcorn. Holidays always seemed too loaded with expectations planning and forced gift giving. Perhaps this is why for the last few years I have found myself at the Taos Pueblo on Christmas Eve. Every year the Pueblo opens it doors to the surrounding community. People come from miles away to the 800 year old village that sits at the foot of the Sangre De Cristo Mountain beneath the Pueblo’s sacred Blue Lake.

The inhabitants build huge bonfires throughout the central courtyard, and open their little stores where you can get hot chocolate and cider. People, of all faiths and races, mill about, talking and warming themselves under the usually clear, star filled sky. Some people bring and pass bottles of wine and “joints”. I haven’t used any drugs in years, but I am still quite capable, perhaps even more capable now, of enjoying the company and good cheer. Last year I stood by a fire and talked to a man from India visiting the Southwest with his family. He said they felt at home here in this community of people standing by the fires, friendly.

Shortly after sunset the church bell rings and a procession emerges from the little adobe, Catholic Church. Men with rifles walk alongside a mock crib with baby Jesus and Mother Mary. Every few paces the men fire the rifles. I don’t care for that part, and I’m not sure what it means. But, it does seem to be a blending of two cultures. I do like the moment of silence that follows, sort of the way I like the silence of the rifle salute given at the burial of veterans. There is something about the silence following the loud shot that seems to make everything new for an instant. I like the way the sound of bagpipes lingers into the silence at burials for this same reason. Maybe because it resonates with the notion of death/beauty I wrote about a few months ago in this column, and/or because Christmas is a birthday.

One year, one of the youth at the center started a fire with towels in the basement. Smoke drifted up the corridors, and through the heat vents and clothes' shoots. This was an equally powerful symbol of another type. Fire engines instead of reindeer arrived that night.

After the ceremony at the Taos Pueblo people stay by the fire and talk until the flames dwindle and the chill settles in. Then we all walk back to our cars in the dark. The walk has gotten pretty long in recent years because the event has become very popular. Many people seem to be looking for a way to escape the traditional hoopla of Christmas Eve. Personally, I liked it better when the crowds were smaller. Maybe I won’t go this year.

Suzanne has preferred to stay back up at our place on the side of the mountain with her own “bond fire". When I get back we sit there, eat shrimp or some other delight. Our son calls, and we talk. Maybe this year we will have a friend or two over. Yes, I like this thought. In hindsight, maybe I should have taken the kids camping on Christmas. We could have sat together under the stars making our own happening. It’s still possible, I suppose, just a small group of us by the fire. Maybe “real” reindeer will show up.