“St. Nick, I’m Stuck!”

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone. Sorry for not having touched the blog for nearly a week. I’ve been struggling once again. However, today I feel in an okay place mentally at least, so I thought I’d join in with John Holton’s Writer’s Workshop. One of the prompts is to share when you learned that Santa/the Easter bunny/the tooth fairy was your parents.

I’ll have to talk about St. Nicholas rather than any of the others here, because that’s what we celebrate most here in the Netherlands. St. Nicholas is like Santa, except he has helpers called Peters. They used to be black, but now they come in every color or with black streaks across their faces (from creeping through chimneys to deliver presents) because the concept of Black Peter is racist.

I was eight the last year when I still believed in St. Nick. This was 1994. As the legend goes, St. Nick and his Peters would ride over the rooftops on a white horse and maybe they’d descend through the chimney to deliver presents.

That year, on the evening of December 5, my parents, sister and I were having dinner when we heard noise coming from the roof. We didn’t have a chimney, but I was still too clueless to think about that. “St. Nick, help, I’m stuck!” We went looking for where the sound came from and saw that there were presents in the loft under the staircase.

Eight is a fairly old age to still believe in St. Nick. In fact, I’d been packaging St. Nicholas presents for my teachers for several years by then. By the year after this, when literally everyone my age had stopped believing, my father spoiled the beans for me: he came to me with a cassette tape, put it in the player and there it was: “St. Nick, help, I’m stuck!” It was his own voice, slightly distorted. By that time, I knew for sure that St. Nicholas was my parents.

14 thoughts on ““St. Nick, I’m Stuck!””

    2. I’m not sure. I grew up in a non-religious household and am not a Christian either. Also, one of my classmates who did grow up in a fundamentalist Christian household said she never believed in those things and at the time, our teacher told us that some Christian parents don’t teach kids about Santa etc. because they fear that, when they lose their belief in Santa, out too is their belief in God.

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  2. My traumatic loss of Father Christmas came when I was seven at school. We had to write a letter to Father Christmas and the girl in front of me turned round and said ‘What’s the point of that when Father Christmas doesn’t even exist.’ Shamefully I did not defend Santa, but just agreed with her how silly, I wasn’t going to let on to her that I believed in him.. As soon as I got home I asked Mum, who admitted the awful truth, but made me promise not to tell my younger brother and sister and spoil their fun.

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  3. I’m happy to hear that you are feeling a little better. Actually today I am having a better day that I have had in a long time. I’ve been so full sad and filled with so much anxiety. Let’s stay happy. ((HUGS))

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    1. Not yet fully outlawed. I’m not even sure the official St. Nicholas celebration has colored or black streak ones. The debate is still ongoing, honestly. However, it’s my opinion that, in this respect, Black voices should be centered and, indeed, the concept of Zwarte Piet does have racist connotations. Even if it didn’t, the mere fact that Black people are offended by it, should matter more than “tradition”.

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  5. Sorry you have had a rough week, but glad this day was better for you. May your week continue to improve.

    I don’t recall when I truly stopped believing … it was more of a gradual thing from little hints here and there. Seeing baby teeth in mom’s jewelry box, knowing one room was off limits at Christmas time and dad always knowing the exact number of easter eggs hidden. It all just kind of added up.

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    1. Thanks so much for your supportive comment and for sharing your experiences. For me, stopping to believe in St. Nicholas probably wasn’t a sudden thing like I described here either, since like I said I did package gifts for my teachers prior to that tape player incident, so things must’ve started to not add up in my brain too.

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