HUMOR: Father Christmas, in July
The Kinks screwed up Christmas for Santa. The intrepid Drew Gallagher, over several old fashions, gets an FXBG Advance EXCLUSIVE (Editor's Note: If your kids still believe, don't leave the screen up.)
By Drew Gallagher
HUMORIST
After a recent Father’s Day column, some readers bemoaned the fact that Father Christmas did not make my list of Famous Fathers. The criticism was not unexpected, but there was a reason for the omission and, after much badgering and pestering (please note that this never crossed over into “hectoring” for reasons that will become obvious), I was able to get Father Christmas to discuss why he asked not to be included on such a prestigious list of Famous Fathers on a Substack.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
(Father Christmas insisted that the interview be conducted in the middle of the summer to avoid any unwanted attention. He agreed to meet me at Curitiba at 919 Caroline Street for the interview as long as I did not alert members of the media. Before the interview, I confirmed that neither Adele Uphaus nor Cathy Dyson would be going to Curitiba on that day. I did this by simply asking them if they wanted to grab drinks at Curitiba and they both politely, and predictably, declined.
In faded khaki cargo shorts, well-used hiking boots, and an open blue and green flannel shirt, Father Christmas looked more like the bass player in a Pearl Jam cover band that once played at roller rinks on Saturday nights in Ames, Iowa, than the typical image of jolly St. Nick. The only indication of who he really was lay in a poorly fitted t-shirt that read: “Ray Davies Can Blow It Out His Ass”. We ordered bourbon drinks and he reminisced briefly on a week he spent at Carnival in Rio recounting that Mrs. Claus was “not happy.” He chuckled to himself, but there was no bowl full of jelly in the emaciated figure before me.)
Father Christmas: If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.
Humorist: Yeah, the café closes in a few hours, so we probably don’t have time for all of that, but I am duly impressed that you memorized the opening of The Catcher in The Rye.
FC: I brought that to you for Christmas 1984. Sorry, I kind of like ragging on Dickens every chance I get. But not as much as I like ragging on those Davies’ brothers.
H: You mean Ray and Dave of the rock band The Kinks?
FC: Well, no s**t. I thought that was our whole reason for doing this dumb interview.
H: Sorry, just wanted to establish context for my readers and make sure we were all following along.
(Father Christmas takes a long drink from his glass. Spilling a few drops into his unkempt beard.)
FC: Classy place. They don’t put umbrellas in your drink. You think anyone is going to read this interview or care?
H: That is probably the very question my editors are asking themselves as they read this. Or some version of why is Drew interviewing Santa Claus in July?
FC: The only reason Santa is talking to Drew is that he was promised free rein and as many rum drinks as he can put away before closing time.
H: The Davies brothers then.
FC: Yes, those little f**kers.
H: Any chance you can tamp down the profanity just to keep those pesky editors of mine happy?
FC: What is your definition of “free rein”? Because mine includes lots of profanity. I fly around the world with reindeer every year for f**ksake. You want an exclusive with Father Christmas then you better be ready to sit on Santa’s lap and show some god-d**ned appreciation and patience. Remember who brought you the Navarone playset in 1978? Or the stuffed pink elephant in Reading Hospital when you had to spend Christmas there? Because I sure as f**k do.
H: Why was the elephant pink by the way?
FC: Because I figured you might be dying and wouldn’t give a rat’s ass what color it was.
H: Was I really close to dying?
FC: (Santa shrugs.) How the hell should I know? I’m not a doctor. I wasn’t going to waste a more popular color of stuffed elephant on a kid who had just spent a week in a plastic bubble.
H: You mentioned 1991 in our prior conversation.
FC: You mean when you got the sweet leather jacket?
H: I thought that was from my girlfriend.
FC: Hmmmph. She didn’t like you that much.
H: 1991?
FC: The song was released in 1977, but no one paid a whole lot of attention to it. Barely registered on the charts like a lot of the dreck The Kinks were putting out at the time. Have you heard Art Lover? That song blows and is probably illegal on some level. Anyway, I was still somebody. Revered and never left wanting for milk and cookies. That all changed during the Christmas season in 1991.
(Santa looks wistfully into the bottom of an empty glass and signals for another Old Fashioned. He did not speak again until a new drink was placed in front of him.)
FC: I don’t know if I was bigger than Jesus but I was definitely bigger than The Beatles and certainly bigger than the mother**king Kinks. No one was f**king with Santa until a couple of kids heard that song before Christmas ’91 and decided to kick my ass.
H: The song you are referencing is Father Christmas?
FC: Yeah. One Christmas I’m getting milk and cookies and the next I’m getting robbed with machine guns by kids who could care less about Cabbage Patch Kids. Problem is that I don’t just walk around town with cash. I’m not an ATM machine. They demanded money, and when I didn’t have any, well, I still have nightmares about the beatings from the kids who got nothin’.
The worst thing about it is that part of me always knew that there would be a day of reckoning. You can’t just give some kids a few Hot Wheels and a Barbie knockoff while others are getting 10-speed bikes and full Manchester United kits. The disparity was on full display as soon as Christmas break was over, and they all went back to school and realized the world was not equal. The spark of revolution was always there, but the Davies’ boys and that stupid song built it into a towering inferno.
H: So what did you do?
FC: I quit. Handed the gig off to some other fat fool. Let him get his head kicked in because kids no longer had time for my “silly little toys”. It wasn’t fun any longer. Sure, the chimney thing and the soot were starting to take a toll on my lungs, but I was somebody and I had an inhaler. When I entered a room men would take off their hats. People respected me until some stupid song pointed out that cuddly toys weren’t going to get Dad a job.
H: That had to be difficult.
(Father Christmas nods sullenly.)
H: So that is why you didn’t feel you were worthy of inclusion in my Famous Fathers list?
FC: Truthfully, it wasn’t so much inclusion in your dumb list that bothered me, but I’ve been holding onto this anger for a long time now. I wanted the world to know that my life was ruined by Ray and Dave Davies and The Kinks.
H: I’m not sure that an interview in a Substack will alert the world to your blood feud with the Davies’ brothers, but I appreciate you confiding in me.
FC: I also heard this place made really good Old Fashioneds.
(Father Christmas spoke not a word as he finished off his drink. He stood up and laid his finger aside his nose and blew a glob of black mucus out of his nose and wiped it on his sleeve. With a wink of his eye, a twist of his head, he was gone into the good night. The bells above the Curitiba front door jingled like sleigh bells. Or it could have been someone’s cell phone ring tone.)
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