Sunday, August 13, 2006

In defense of the Easter Bunny

The following is an excerpt from page 83 of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I read it on the flight down to DC and I'm surprised by how much I'm enjoying it. Its a discussion that a young mother is having with her mother about how to raise a child she feels she isn't prepared for. The excerpt struck me as the most valid argument I have yet come across for teaching my kids about Santa Claus:

"And you must tell the child the legends I told you - as my mother told them to me and her mother to her. You must tell the fairy tails of the old country. You must tell of those not of this earth who live forever in the hearts of people - fairies, elves, dwarfs and such. You must tell of the great ghosts that haunted your father's people and of the evil eye which a hex put on your aunt. You must teach the child of the signs that come to the women of our family when there is trouble and death to be. And the child must believe in the Lord God and Jesus, His Only Son." She crossed herself.
"Oh, and you must not forget the Kris Kringle. The child must believe in him until she reaches the age of six."
"Mother, I know there are no ghosts or fairies. I would be teaching the child foolish lies."
Mary spoke sharply. "You do not know whether there are not ghosts on earth or angels in heaven."
"I know there is no Santa Claus."
"Yet you must teach the child that these things are so."
"Why? When I, myself, do not believe?"
"Because," explained Mary Rommely simply, "the child must have a valuable thing which is called imagination. The child must have a secret world in which live things that never were. It is necessary that she believes. She must start out by believing in things not of this world. Then when the world becomes too ugly for living in, the child can reach back and live in her imagination. I, myself, even in this day and at my age, have great need of recalling the miraculous lives of the Saints and the great miracles that have come to pass on earth. Only by having these things in my mind can I live beyond what I have to live for."
"The child will grow up and find out things for herself. She will know that I lied. She will be disappointed."
"That is what is called learning the truth. It is a good thing to learn the truth one's self. To first believe with all your heart, and then not to believe is good too. It fattens the emotions and makes them to stretch. When as a women life and people disappoint her, she will have had practice in disappointment and it will not come so hard. In teaching your child, do not forget that suffering is good too. It makes a person rich in character."

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