Which List Are You On?

It’s nearly time. Santa’s getting sore eyes from reading all those letters, the reindeer are going through their visualisation techniques for perfect rooftop landings after a full year of training and turkeys all over the world are wondering why all their buddies keep disappearing.

It’s nearly Christmas.

Children the world over are hoping that Father Christmas (or whatever local name he has where they are) has placed them on his ‘Nice’ list. Whatever their age, nobody wants to be on the ‘Naughty’ list.

We all know that good children get good gifts, but how come nobody ever talks about what happens to those who have been bad? Maybe it’s a shame thing, like how nobody talks about a particularly embarrassing rash or that strange old Uncle that no one’s seen for the longest time?

Wonder no more. And never say that my blog isn’t educational. The ‘Naughty’ list was once a very real threat.

This is one of those things that the man with the sack has evolved over time, like changing the colour of his cloak from predominately green to red or climbing down chimneys to deliver his gifts instead of just dropping them into stockings hung beside an open window. These days of course he prefers using his magic key instead of messing about with the chimney climbing. It must be his age.

Maybe that’s why he’s mellowed over the years too. There was a time when the naughty children of the world could expect some serious punishment from the jolly old fat man. He’d actually whip them, so legend has it, or pop them into a sack while they slept and carry them off to Spain, where he is said to spend his summer holidays. Suddenly he doesn’t seem quite so jolly.

He didn’t used to do these unpleasant things on his own though. While these days he just has his jolly elves to help him deliver goods to the world’s good boys and girls, once upon a time he had a shackled demon called Black Pete to assist him with the punishment of naughty kids. The story goes that Saint Nicholas defeated the demon and enslaved him, making Black Pete do his dirty work. And let’s face it, if you have to be whipped by someone then I guess an angry demon in chains would be far from the top of the list of people you’d pick to do it.

I guess that Santa has been working on his P.R. more in recent years though, as the whole whipping thing has been hushed up and he seems to have cut right back on the child-abduction too. All in all I think that’s a good thing.

As for Black Pete, well he’s rarely heard of these days, except in Scandinavian countries where he’s still sometimes seen helping his beardy boss in the run up to the big day. Even there he’s been given a make-over though, seeming to have become almost as jolly as the main man himself. The worst he does these days is threaten to leave children a lump of coal instead of gifts if they haven’t been good, or maybe a twig to remind them of the olden days when he’d deliver a thrashing with one.

So with this in mind, I hope that everyone in your household has been good this year. And that Father Christmas continues to get nicer as he gets older.

Have a great Christmas.