Question of the Day

Another one suggested by Mama Shakes, who always manages to come up with great QotDs: What was your "age of awakening"—when you discovered Santa/Easter Bunny/Tooth Fairy/other childhood icon wasn't real?

I remember clear as a bell the exact moment of my awakening. It was Christmas Eve 1977, so I was three and a half years old. I'm fairly certain I rarely, if ever, got out of bed in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom or ask for something, but, for some reason, that night I woke up and decided I needed a glass of water. So I walked out into the living room and saw my parents putting together a spring horse for me.

I still remember how they froze like deer in the headlights—Papa Shakes rockin' the 70s porkchop sideburns and Mama Shakes majorly pregnant and about to pop out my sister two weeks later. It's like a Polaroid picture jammed in my brain. They just stared at me while I took in the situation, and I can honestly still remember the realization that they were Santa Claus slowly washing over me—and just how it felt. I totally wasn't disappointed. I thought it was pretty cool that I'd figured the whole thing out, actually.

I also remember a subsequent "talk" Mama Shakes had with me to not tell the other kids at nursery school, lest I ruin Easter (and next Christmas) for them. Heh.

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