Last Christmas I felt like I had lost my Christmas Spirit- so I dug deep and found it again.

What I came across was how excited I was, as a kid,  about Krampus and how he visited bad kids for Christmas ( and he got the naughty list from Santa- what a snitch!)

So for me it was the ultimate win win- if I was good I got a visit from Santa- if not I got a visit from a demonic monster.

I couldn’t believe my luck.

My holidays were going to be Merry, no matter how bad I screwed up and as a kid I did plenty of that.

So among the things I’m sure showed up on my charge list were:

Well…I did.

I scared my brother and sister on purpose with my own made up horror stories.

I dug up my neighbor’s yards on the way to school because I was looking for vampires.

I stole penny candies from the store on the corner because I hated one of the cashiers ( to be fair, she did refer to me as the little mongrel girl- my parents were at the time one of the not many mixed race couples living in our hometown ). She’d haul me into the managers office and I’d eat the candy on the way there. I was six and I had no idea I was destroying evidence. I  just liked the look on her face when she saw me chewing and the trail of candy wrappers behind me.

Me and my friend used to climb out the window at school and shimmied across the ledge to the fire escape because our class was two floors up from the ground – we wouldn’t come back even when the teacher caught us. She’d go out on the fire escape and we would crawl around the ledge and try to get into another window. We used to bark like dogs when we did that- I really have no explanation for that part.

But when I was good, well to be perfectly honest about it, my Mom and Dad had a low threshold for that because I was such a little weirdo.

As long as blood, fire or an angry mob wanting my head wasn’t involved, they were pretty happy with me.

Like I said, it was a win-win for me.

What brought back those memories about how much I liked Krampus was an old ornament that I saw in one of my family’s Christmas pictures. He was  pretty vicious looking and he was posed on a fireplace mantle with little Santa and his reindeer figurines.

He was sort of Godzilla sized compare to the delicate little figures.

He was also one of my favorite decorations.

My Grandpa used to tell me about Krampus, but if he was telling a cautionary tale I missed the point ( as I usually did ) and I guess he knew it because he’d pour himself a drink, load up his plate with Bourbon Balls and then he’d launch into a bunch of stories about Krampus. I’m pretty sure he made most of them up because most of the kids who showed up on Krampus’ list were named ” Anita ” or ” Anita Marie ” .

I used to think that was pretty cool.

This year I’m in a much better place with the Christmas Season- and I have Krampus to thank for that- in case you’re wondering what that thunk was, I’m pretty sure it was Santa facepalming himself into a mild head injury.

Ho Ho Ho and Merry Christmas!

Anita Marie

Our Random View: Christmas Writing Prompt #1 – Last Christmas