There comes a time in a child’s life–it was at age 10 or 11 for me–that he or she feels not quite a kid and not quite an adult. One Christmas season my parents took me and my sisters and brother to visit my uncle, aunt, and cousins in Duncanville, about an hour from our home. They wanted to take us to downtown Dallas to visit Titche’s department store (later to become Joske’s and then Dillard’s). It was our first trip to the big city and the skyscrapers impressed us kids. Titche’s had several floors, and it was Christmas, so my aunt took us to the floor where Santa Claus was. Having already learned “the truth” about Santa Claus, I was mortified when she had all of us kids, hers included, pose for a photo with Santa. I almost died of embarrassment standing there with the children, thinking I was much too old to be in a Santa picture. My mother made me.

Each of us was given a Dr Dolittle figure as a favor (or maybe my aunt or parents bought them, I don’t remember), and I did like that part of the Santa visit. The next day I played with my Dolittle doll in the cold December sunshine on the neighborhood sidewalks with my cousins and siblings. We didn’t have sidewalks in the country, and the houses weren’t as close together. Titche’s eventually changed ownership, but the Italian Renaissance-inspired structure still remains in downtown Dallas, hosting apartments and small businesses.

As for me, I got over my aversion to family portraits and forced my own children to participate, preteen angst notwithstanding. They also know the truth about Santa Claus: if you don’t believe, you don’t receive.

Do you have a memory from the in-between years?

XOXO