An Age of Innocence
Dear Reader
I want to relate to you a story about a Christmas past and how I spent Christmas Day in hospital.
But first things first, a warning – if you should stumble across this narrative please be sure to burn it after reading. It would be too dangerous to keep in your possession even for a day. I would have burnt the many copies I made myself but I know that some still exist. In those days I was a braver man, believing that freedom of speech existed. Now I know different.
It’s a simple story about a simpler and kinder world, an age of innocence, a world in which the weather wasn’t controlled by the state, a world in which we had a Queen and Royal Family before President Cameron declared the United Kingdom a Republic and a world where children believed in a strange man in a red cloak with a large white beard known as Father Christmas or Santa Claus.
So let me take you back in time for a simple story about my son. The actual date has been lost like so many in the mists of time and the State’s ban on writing diaries and destroying those that previously existed hasn’t helped.
I think my son Robert would have been about seven years of age, which would put the date at around 2018 – four years before the republic was brought into being and the passing of the bill to end personal memories and destruction of all history-related books, leaving us as a state with very little past and probably even less future. But I digress.
Things in the year I am describing were much simpler and state control was much less intrusive on the life of citizens. Father Christmas still lived in the minds and hearts of young children and every department store still had its own Santa who gave gifts to young children for the price of an entry ticket.
As we now know the Government banned these Santas under the Freedom of Choice Act – a piece of legislation that we were told would give us greater freedom but which had the opposite effect. Santas were banned on the grounds that once we had paid our money we would have no choice over either receiving a present or what exactly that present was. It was all part of the Government’s war on waste. They simply didn’t want unwanted gifts turning up in rubbish bins throughout the land, particularly in light of the banning of charity shops.
Mention Father Christmas, charity shops and department stores to the youngsters of today and they stare at you with an incomprehensible look on their faces. All shopping is carried out electronically, but the choice of items to buy is very small.
But back to 2018 when Robert still believed in Father Christmas. It must have been Christmas Eve, just a day before Christmas Day when we celebrated with roast turkey before The Animals Right to Live Act turned everyone into vegetarians and the Vegetables Right to Live Act took us even further and limited us to eating unappetising state food that could have contained absolutely anything and probably did.
Our conversation on Christmas Eve went something like:
Robert: “Dad can we skype Father Christmas tonight?”
Me: “I don’t think Father Christmas is on Skype Robert.”
“Then can we Facetime him.”
“Robert I think Father Christmas is far too busy to be skyped or facetimed. Think of how many calls he would get and how would he then have time to deliver presents to every boy or girl in the world?”
“Well could we e-mail him because I’m not sure he will have received my letter.”
“Oh I’m sure he has received your letter, Robert. Now why don’t you go to bed. It’s late and the sooner you go to sleep, the sooner Christmas will be here.”
“Just one more question Dad.”
“Yes”
“If everyone leaves out a mince pie and a glass of sherry he’ll be pissed by the time he reaches Russia and will probably fall out of his sleigh by the time he gets to our house. What happens if he gets breathalysed?”
“Robert I really think that’s enough questions and please don’t swear. Just accept that Santa knows what he’s doing, he’s been doing it an awfully long time and gets it right every year.”
He seemed to accept this answer and with a relatively cheery goodnight went to his bedroom.
“Don’t forget to brush your teeth,” I shouted up. I have to point out that this was before the Anti-Advice law which essentially prevented parents from making any demands on their children. President Cameron had told us that it was unreasonable to ask our children to do anything we probably didn’t do when we were their age. I suppose he may have had a point.
But as the years went by it did feel more and more that we had become a part of what was called a “nanny state” although in our case it would have been a great great great grandma state if the learning of history and study of family history hadn’t been banned on the grounds that the future was so glorious that the past had become irrelevant.
Back to 2018. Over the next hour there were a few noises from Robert’s bedroom but we thought nothing of them. My wife made the drinks and stayed mainly quiet. She was at the time taking the “women should only speak when spoken to” course and was taking it very seriously indeed. I suppose looking back these courses were really the start of the troubles. Taking the vote away from women under the “Men Must Re-Assert Themselves” law was to me a retrograde step, although I would never venture that opinion of course.
After about an hour everything was quiet upstairs. I usually checked on Robert to see if he was asleep but on this night I knew he would probably be awake most of the night. So the present drop had to be done very early morning when he, hopefully, would be asleep.
At that time some family customs were still in place. It is my understanding from talking to friends, or should I say friends who were brave enough to discuss the past, that most still put their presents under a Christmas Tree in the lounge. Christmas Trees had long been banned under the Cruelty to Nature Act. We had never understood the logic of putting presents under the tree. How could you tell a youngster that Father Christmas would be bringing his presents if they were there in the lounge wrapped up and on display to everyone?
So we had always hidden Robert’s presents and in the early hours of Christmas Morning slid them into his bedroom once we were certain he was asleep.
Probably an hour or so later we would be woken up by the scream of “He’s Been” and that led to very early Christmas Morning present opening.
So Christmas 2018 was no different. We went to bed around midnight and at about 4 a.m I woke to take Robert’s parcels out of our wardrobe where they had been carefully concealed.
Many of his presents would come via relatives and friends coming round during the day, but there were enough to make a decent pile, but not too many that they couldn’t be carried in one go. I was unable to see over the top of the mound of presents but as. Robert’s room was next to ours I could find my way there with my eyes shut anyway.
So in the early hours of Christmas morning 2018, before dawn, I quietly pushed Roberts door open with my stomach, took a step forward into the room and let out a scream.
Parcels somersaulted into the air and I followed them as a series of lights and buzzers went off. The last thing I remember was treading on what must have been a number of ball bearings, losing my footing and cracking my head on an antique dressing table. And as I went down and lost consciousness I swear I heard Robert shout
“Caught You Dad.”
The next thing I remember was waking up in a hospital bed suffering from what they told me was concussion. I was allowed home late on Christmas Day.
Now all those years later when I meet up with Robert we still have a laugh about that night (although Robert, being a good party man, would never tell the story in public). It’s only when we are alone together and he lets his guard down a little that we can reminisce abut a past that the republic says never existed. We cannot afford to disobey the “Live in the Moment” Act which bans any thoughts or talk about the past.
When I got home from hospital later that day Robert explained that he had huge suspicions that Father Christmas could in no way deliver to millions of homes throughout the world. He also had suspicions that the parcels that magically turned up in his bedroom on Christmas morning were put there by myself. His suspicions were further aroused by the way I had evaded answering the skype and facetime comments.
So, being something of an electronic wizard, he had put in place a simple trip wire which was linked to a lamp and buzzer. He hadn’t reckoned on me losing my balance and cracking my head and missing most of Christmas Day due to being in hospital.
I have to say it wasn’t my greatest Christmas but I do laugh about it now, particularly in the light of Robert’s final comment on the subject late that Christmas night.
“Sorry that I made you fall over and bump your head dad. But you’ve got to understand that I needed to find out the truth. It’s a ridiculous idea that one man can deliver presents to every home in the world. I now know that every home has an agent for Santa so that Santa can just do one continent each year and I reckon this year it was Africa!”
The End
Dear Reader
I want to relate to you a story about a Christmas past and how I spent Christmas Day in hospital.
But first things first, a warning – if you should stumble across this narrative please be sure to burn it after reading. It would be too dangerous to keep in your possession even for a day. I would have burnt the many copies I made myself but I know that some still exist. In those days I was a braver man, believing that freedom of speech existed. Now I know different.
It’s a simple story about a simpler and kinder world, an age of innocence, a world in which the weather wasn’t controlled by the state, a world in which we had a Queen and Royal Family before President Cameron declared the United Kingdom a Republic and a world where children believed in a strange man in a red cloak with a large white beard known as Father Christmas or Santa Claus.
So let me take you back in time for a simple story about my son. The actual date has been lost like so many in the mists of time and the State’s ban on writing diaries and destroying those that previously existed hasn’t helped.
I think my son Robert would have been about seven years of age, which would put the date at around 2018 – four years before the republic was brought into being and the passing of the bill to end personal memories and destruction of all history-related books, leaving us as a state with very little past and probably even less future. But I digress.
Things in the year I am describing were much simpler and state control was much less intrusive on the life of citizens. Father Christmas still lived in the minds and hearts of young children and every department store still had its own Santa who gave gifts to young children for the price of an entry ticket.
As we now know the Government banned these Santas under the Freedom of Choice Act – a piece of legislation that we were told would give us greater freedom but which had the opposite effect. Santas were banned on the grounds that once we had paid our money we would have no choice over either receiving a present or what exactly that present was. It was all part of the Government’s war on waste. They simply didn’t want unwanted gifts turning up in rubbish bins throughout the land, particularly in light of the banning of charity shops.
Mention Father Christmas, charity shops and department stores to the youngsters of today and they stare at you with an incomprehensible look on their faces. All shopping is carried out electronically, but the choice of items to buy is very small.
But back to 2018 when Robert still believed in Father Christmas. It must have been Christmas Eve, just a day before Christmas Day when we celebrated with roast turkey before The Animals Right to Live Act turned everyone into vegetarians and the Vegetables Right to Live Act took us even further and limited us to eating unappetising state food that could have contained absolutely anything and probably did.
Our conversation on Christmas Eve went something like:
Robert: “Dad can we skype Father Christmas tonight?”
Me: “I don’t think Father Christmas is on Skype Robert.”
“Then can we Facetime him.”
“Robert I think Father Christmas is far too busy to be skyped or facetimed. Think of how many calls he would get and how would he then have time to deliver presents to every boy or girl in the world?”
“Well could we e-mail him because I’m not sure he will have received my letter.”
“Oh I’m sure he has received your letter, Robert. Now why don’t you go to bed. It’s late and the sooner you go to sleep, the sooner Christmas will be here.”
“Just one more question Dad.”
“Yes”
“If everyone leaves out a mince pie and a glass of sherry he’ll be pissed by the time he reaches Russia and will probably fall out of his sleigh by the time he gets to our house. What happens if he gets breathalysed?”
“Robert I really think that’s enough questions and please don’t swear. Just accept that Santa knows what he’s doing, he’s been doing it an awfully long time and gets it right every year.”
He seemed to accept this answer and with a relatively cheery goodnight went to his bedroom.
“Don’t forget to brush your teeth,” I shouted up. I have to point out that this was before the Anti-Advice law which essentially prevented parents from making any demands on their children. President Cameron had told us that it was unreasonable to ask our children to do anything we probably didn’t do when we were their age. I suppose he may have had a point.
But as the years went by it did feel more and more that we had become a part of what was called a “nanny state” although in our case it would have been a great great great grandma state if the learning of history and study of family history hadn’t been banned on the grounds that the future was so glorious that the past had become irrelevant.
Back to 2018. Over the next hour there were a few noises from Robert’s bedroom but we thought nothing of them. My wife made the drinks and stayed mainly quiet. She was at the time taking the “women should only speak when spoken to” course and was taking it very seriously indeed. I suppose looking back these courses were really the start of the troubles. Taking the vote away from women under the “Men Must Re-Assert Themselves” law was to me a retrograde step, although I would never venture that opinion of course.
After about an hour everything was quiet upstairs. I usually checked on Robert to see if he was asleep but on this night I knew he would probably be awake most of the night. So the present drop had to be done very early morning when he, hopefully, would be asleep.
At that time some family customs were still in place. It is my understanding from talking to friends, or should I say friends who were brave enough to discuss the past, that most still put their presents under a Christmas Tree in the lounge. Christmas Trees had long been banned under the Cruelty to Nature Act. We had never understood the logic of putting presents under the tree. How could you tell a youngster that Father Christmas would be bringing his presents if they were there in the lounge wrapped up and on display to everyone?
So we had always hidden Robert’s presents and in the early hours of Christmas Morning slid them into his bedroom once we were certain he was asleep.
Probably an hour or so later we would be woken up by the scream of “He’s Been” and that led to very early Christmas Morning present opening.
So Christmas 2018 was no different. We went to bed around midnight and at about 4 a.m I woke to take Robert’s parcels out of our wardrobe where they had been carefully concealed.
Many of his presents would come via relatives and friends coming round during the day, but there were enough to make a decent pile, but not too many that they couldn’t be carried in one go. I was unable to see over the top of the mound of presents but as. Robert’s room was next to ours I could find my way there with my eyes shut anyway.
So in the early hours of Christmas morning 2018, before dawn, I quietly pushed Roberts door open with my stomach, took a step forward into the room and let out a scream.
Parcels somersaulted into the air and I followed them as a series of lights and buzzers went off. The last thing I remember was treading on what must have been a number of ball bearings, losing my footing and cracking my head on an antique dressing table. And as I went down and lost consciousness I swear I heard Robert shout
“Caught You Dad.”
The next thing I remember was waking up in a hospital bed suffering from what they told me was concussion. I was allowed home late on Christmas Day.
Now all those years later when I meet up with Robert we still have a laugh about that night (although Robert, being a good party man, would never tell the story in public). It’s only when we are alone together and he lets his guard down a little that we can reminisce abut a past that the republic says never existed. We cannot afford to disobey the “Live in the Moment” Act which bans any thoughts or talk about the past.
When I got home from hospital later that day Robert explained that he had huge suspicions that Father Christmas could in no way deliver to millions of homes throughout the world. He also had suspicions that the parcels that magically turned up in his bedroom on Christmas morning were put there by myself. His suspicions were further aroused by the way I had evaded answering the skype and facetime comments.
So, being something of an electronic wizard, he had put in place a simple trip wire which was linked to a lamp and buzzer. He hadn’t reckoned on me losing my balance and cracking my head and missing most of Christmas Day due to being in hospital.
I have to say it wasn’t my greatest Christmas but I do laugh about it now, particularly in the light of Robert’s final comment on the subject late that Christmas night.
“Sorry that I made you fall over and bump your head dad. But you’ve got to understand that I needed to find out the truth. It’s a ridiculous idea that one man can deliver presents to every home in the world. I now know that every home has an agent for Santa so that Santa can just do one continent each year and I reckon this year it was Africa!”
The End