Dear Mr. Claus,

Can we be pen-pals for eleven months a year?

January, 2025

My name is Claire Elyse Brosseau, and I’m the exact same age I have been for the past few years. Congratulations on another year of keeping lies/magic alive. I haven’t exactly been on my best behaviour, but why start now?

You may remember me as an adorable, privileged, hilarious, brat. We’d leave you cookies and milk, but we also left you a beer. If every house did that, you’d clearly be drinking and sleighing. Complete, reckless disregard. Maybe your alcohol metabolism is different because you’re Santa. I’ll ask my psychiatrist tomorrow.

When I was a kid, you rewarded me so generously for acting like a dick. Thank you for having my back. My parents didn’t walk around shaking spare diamonds in their pockets, but I was spoiled. Did you know Santa? May I call you Santa? I was such a monster. Were you just not paying attention? Several babysitters refused to come back, and it definitely wasn’t because of Melissa. I don’t think my sister has ever been disciplined once in her life. Do you know how many times my parents (my mom) were called in to see Mme. Paquette (the principle) during the years when I believed in you most (and thereafter)? I got spanked at school with “la brosse” (the chalkboard eraser). Only once, but zero times would’ve been ideal. Still, you kept the Cabbage-Patch Kids, Care Bears, Pound-Puppies, Barbies, boomboxes, skis, books, tennis rackets, skates, pogo-balls, marbles, Big Wheels, concert-tickets, Monchhichis, hair-crimpers, cleats, and vacations coming.

I was always so worried for my friends at school who lived in apartment buildings because they had no chimneys. My parents insisted you were up to some escapology shit, but I think we all know that you straight-up broke into their homes.

In my day (thanks be to God) we didn’t have that little authoritarian creep elf who hides on the shelf. The whistleblower who hangs on furniture I wouldn’t touch. Our chandelier was crystal. Who does he think he is? Sia? He just sits there with his dead-ass stare, recording children's behaviour and reporting it back to you. Why, Santa? Was it because of kids like me?

Teaching children about a police state during the holidays is definitely sending a message. Of course we knew that you could see us when we were sleeping and when we were awake, but you didn’t come into our house and freak us all out, for goodness sake! Tell the little snitch to back-off. That mini nordic-looking rat-bastard wouldn’t last a minute at my house. My family knows how to keep secrets. Hard-core ones. Dude (may I call you dude?), why can’t he just sit on the bench, like The Mensch? Tell him to act like that guy- it’s his actual name. He’s not even a mensch, he’s The Mench. On the bench. Just the bench. Nowhere else, because he found a place to sit. Like a normal person. The elf is rude. Your informant might consider looking into his heart, and ask hims-elf (*curtsy) why he became a public servant in the first place.

What are your thoughts on birth-order, Santa? I mean, you get to see the highest classified data there is. I’ve been telling my parents to fuck-off since I was six years old. Am I the bad guy in this scenario? My sister was so well behaved, and we still got the same amount of presents. Did I beat the system?! Maybe people with Bipolar Disorder are geniuses after all!

Oh, no. What if the Elf On The Shelf has Bipolar Disorder? Now I feel bad.

Us!

I’m sorry to hear that your corner of the world is warming triple-time. You’re on thin-ice, as they say. I’m familiar with the feeling. Is the Workshop well ventilated? Do the elves wear little tank-tops to work, sometimes? Do some of them have tiny man-buns?! That would be the cutest impact of global warming, ever. Are there lady elves? I don’t remember seeing any. Who cares. Your entire operation will be devoured by the ocean in the next few years either way. What fun!

At least your brother in the South Pole (Gary Claus) has that spare room with the Murphy bed. Gary and I are full-blown pen-pals, so it’s not seasonally-dependent. Mrs. Claus (Gary’s wife ) and I are quite close. That woman is hilarious! She can drink the Tooth Fairy under the equator.

How will the tariffs affect you? Dudes are so stupid.

Santa, everything I’d like to ask you for, you can’t possibly give me. That defines grief. Besides, none of the reindeer could carry the weight of my heart, let alone my bullshit. I’d settle for anything beyond retrospect. Can’t I just have a Gucci Jackie 1961 bag, or something? It’s a timeless classic and you know it, Santa. Where’s my stuff? Stuff makes me happy. Whoever claims the opposite is selling something.

I’ve been thinking about a bespoke Louis Vuitton monogram coffin. You’re welcome, pallbearers. Can you bring me one of those?

Curtesy of the internet.

You must feel so alone when you have a bad day at work. I mean, you only work one day a year (in the field) but still, literally zero people can relate. Hopefully there are bars up there. A pub? I can’t imagine there’s a nightclub, but if there is, is there a tiny coat-check?! Is there a strip-club called The North Pole-Dancers? Because there totally should be.

One Christmas, I asked you for a dude to take me on a date to Ikea (the cafeteria is my favourite restaurant, tied with Medieval Times). First, you smoke a joint in the parking lot, like a normal adult. Then, you eat .75¢ hot dogs and meatballs, hang-out in the living room, go in the bedroom and change into whatever weird earth-tone clothes are hanging in the closet, sit in the kitchen, realize you prefer to sit in another kitchen, and eat more hot dogs. Why aren’t they aren’t doing rose ceremonies in there?

That dude never came, Santa. You’ve certainly made your point, but what a pivot. What changed?

I think of Hermie (the dentist elf) fondly, so please tell him I say hello. I always root for the underdog. It’s why I grew up a Mets fan. Coincidentally Sants (may I call you Sants?), the Toronto Blue Jays are currently being managed by Yukon Cornelious. Now Santa, as you know, I’m looking for a reason to live. I don’t have anything left in life to hang onto. Not to be a drag, but baseball was all I had. My only thing. Last season, it felt like the Toronto Blue Jays wanted all of us to kill ourselves. Do the players think the ball is a shit-grenade? Because they play like it. They’re such a delicate team, with all their “viruses”. If one Toronto Blue Jay gets diarrhea, the entire roster calls in sick, and the whole club shuts down. Imagine they got their periods, Santa?! What a tender little team.

John Schneider, manager of The Toronto Blue Jays & Yukon Cornelius, Arctic Prospector

How was the Naughty/Nice list this year? Do you have a most-wanted list? A guest-list? Do you make to-do, or to-don’t lists? Maybe you want to leave work at work. I love lists so much, Sants. So does my cousin, Alison. She makes a list of the lists she needs. Sometimes I find my old set-lists. It breaks my heart, and not just for the people who had to sit through my act. It’s like The Rolling Stones said on their B-side, we don’t always get what we deserve. You know that better than anyone (except God, obviously).

Here’s a random list for you, Santa.

Theoretically, I can do any of these things without legal consequence (in Canada). Is it exceptionally unlikely that I do any of them? Sure. But everyone’s cool with the list.

1. I can participate in the democratic process, and help choose the leader of the country.

2. I can drive a 4000lbs machine made of steel and glass, at 100km/hr, alongside cars filled with children, pregnant women, people who hate the subway, anyone. Indeed, I can work for Transport Canada. That means airspace. Land. Water. Infrastructure. I can do that.

3. I can be a lifeguard. A babysitter. A snake handler. An accountant. A flight attendant, a bus driver, a landlord, or a therapist. Specialized jobs that require discipline, rationality, composure, reliability, consistency, precision, vigilance, and prudence. I can have those jobs.

4. I can be a therapist. (It’s worth repeating).

5. I can be the Prime Minister of Canada.

6. I can be the Prime Minister’s therapist.

7. I can get an abortion (for now). Body autonomy. My personal choice for safety, body-integrity, and self-ownership. I can get five abortions if I want and frankly, I can’t believe I haven’t. * cough cough *collar-pull

Here’s a random list of a thing that I can’t do, under the law.

1. I can’t have a medically assisted death.

You can, but I can’t. I mean, I don’t know if you can, but Canadians can. Maybe you have diplomatic immunity. Another question for my psychiatrist, I guess. Just remember that ruining Christmas is my thing.

People want to believe that you’re real. I can’t comment on invisible people, it’s not a good look for me. I think it’s the second question on the survey that gets me locked in the psych ward. Survey says, I’m already walking a thin line talking about God. Meanwhile, in the very dark, dystopian future we’re presently living in, I’d like to say on behalf of crazy people and science-fiction, we tried to warn you.

How is Mrs. Claus? Joanne? I’m pretty sure it’s Mrs. Joanne Claus. She should have a book deal. Strike while the biopic-iron is hot. I can write it. I can write, I Did Stuff, Too - By Mrs. Claus. Santa? Hypothetically, if Joanne developed a pattern of acting like an asshole, do you have to sit her down and talk to her about her list-status? That’s got to be awkward, no? While we’re on the subject- coal is a remarkably harsh punishment for being “bad”. Sulfur dioxide dude? Even the UN is phasing out coal. Take it down a notch- we’re all doing the best we can.

Please give Joanne my best (and pitch the book). Mrs. Claus was always my favourite salt-shaker during the holidays. No offence.

May I ask you an ironic question, Santa? Does anyone ever ask you what you want? I mean, obviously no one’s going to get it for you, but is anyone curious? I imagine you must feel a little taken for granted in the months and weeks leading up to our Lord Jesus’s Christ’s birthday bash. It’s always, I want, I want, I want, but radio-silence for the next 11 months. Do you even get thank you cards? Of course everyone knows that you go surfing in July, but still.

That’s why I’m here, Santa. I’m willing to write letters and ask you for stuff all year long. I won’t stop. I will always want stuff. ALWAYS.

Please be well, and may your flightpath never cross with with one of a drone, or a spy-balloon. Stay safe up there. I look forward to your reply.

Best,

Claire Elyse Brosseau