Dads usually aren’t the ones who are fighting the crowds for that last Furby on the shelf or pushing the doors down when Toys-R-Us opens extra early the day after Thanksgiving. Moms usually get the honor to fight with teenage sales people or elbowing her way to the checkout counter. However, dads usually are the ones who don the red suit and fake cotton (or worse, polyester) beard. They also might be the ones who put the bikes together, and in doing so, have to decipher the unhelpful pictures that always seem to miss a step. So who has it worse—moms or dads?
When talking to members of my family, it all seems to be bittersweet. Some decide that they hate the prep work that goes into making every child’s favorite holiday seem like it is the best day ever, and having to top it every year, but when they see their child’s face they know it was worth it. Just chatting with my aunt, she was very enthusiastic with making her Christmas the best for her kids. My mom, however, loved believing in Santa, but wished that there really was a Santa so that she didn’t have to do all that work. In my dad’s opinion, he was happy to do it, but when it came to Christmas Eve, he was always more of a Grinch because he had to stay up late getting everything done. (But they did learn, as we got older to have someone else put the bikes together so that they could go to bed earlier.) My mom always said that he had it easy because he didn’t have to do all the shopping, hiding, wrapping, and everything in between.
When talking to members of my family, it all seems to be bittersweet. Some decide that they hate the prep work that goes into making every child’s favorite holiday seem like it is the best day ever, and having to top it every year, but when they see their child’s face they know it was worth it. Just chatting with my aunt, she was very enthusiastic with making her Christmas the best for her kids. My mom, however, loved believing in Santa, but wished that there really was a Santa so that she didn’t have to do all that work. In my dad’s opinion, he was happy to do it, but when it came to Christmas Eve, he was always more of a Grinch because he had to stay up late getting everything done. (But they did learn, as we got older to have someone else put the bikes together so that they could go to bed earlier.) My mom always said that he had it easy because he didn’t have to do all the shopping, hiding, wrapping, and everything in between.
But if there is one thing that they can agree on, is that it was all worth it, because they loved the holiday itself. I am not sure who I think has it worse, but parents do get to share in the joy of making sure that their kids set Christmas apart from any other day and they get to eat those cookies for Santa.
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