As women, it’s so much harder for us to make a name for ourselves without being compared to others – especially in a male-dominated field. I’m an individual, and my actions shouldn’t be seen through the flattening lens of comparison. That’s why it’s reductive to call me the “female Santa Claus” just because I regularly climb down my neighbors’ chimneys and drink their milk in the middle of the night. And it’s time we talked about it.
To just begin to scrape the surface of how absurd this is, let me say that Santa Claus and I are completely different. Santa Claus visits children once a year, making his way down their chimneys, leaving them presents, and drinking a glass of milk set out for him, perhaps with cookies. So let’s break this down for a minute:
Do I come once a year? No, I come constantly. Seven nights a week, ten nights a week, sometimes the same house twice in one night. Do I bring gifts? Absolutely not. I come with empty hands to aid my agility while shimmying down chimneys, and an empty stomach to fill up with milk, which “incidentally” (not) isn’t set out for me for all, so I have to open the fridge and drink it straight out of the carton because as a woman I’ve been socialized to be timid and polite, and creating a dirty glass would be rude.
So why then, with all these clear distinctions, am I still whittled down to some sort of female reboot of Old St. Nick? Well according to the neighborhood Facebook group that I’m banned from but check from people’s desktops when I’m in their house, covered in chimney soot, slurping down milk, it’s because one “terrified child” caught me in the act, their parent panicked and said I was Santa, kid claimed Santa was a burly man, so parent goes, “it’s female Santa Claus.” I mean, woof. First of all, your kid is sexist, second of all, your kid is dumb.
Did it even occur to them that Santa is magic? I don’t rely on magic to get down tall chimneys and drink milk. I just have an unquenchable thirst for dairy and am unafraid of death. If I were a man, they’d probably have Jason Statham playing me in a biopic by now, but instead I get compared to some crusty old wizard with Chips Ahoy crumbs in his beard.
So next time you go to compare me to Father Winter for climbing down your chimney and drinking up your milk, just don’t! It really is that easy. And not that it’s any of your business, but I wear the red velour tracksuit because it’s comfy.
