While watching the film Red One (starring Dwayne Johnson and J.K. Simmons) recently, a childhood memory connected to Christmas and Santa Claus popped into my head. When Santa’s massive, modern North Pole complex appeared on screen, I mentioned to my wife, Pamela, that my parents had taken my sister, Lisa, and me to Santa’s Workshop, a theme park in North Pole, New York, up in the Adirondacks, one summer when we were small kids in the early 1970s.

My sister Lisa and me when we were small.

When we embarked on the family trip, I was around five years old, and my parents were still married. My ears plugged as our little green station wagon (if I recall correctly) navigated the road, climbing higher into the mountains. Along the way, we stopped for a pancake breakfast at a roadside diner. After hopping out of the car, I observed the ring of surrounding blue mountains, felt the warm sunshine on my neck, and smelled the clean outdoor air.

Once we arrived at the park, I couldn’t wait to see Santa’s reindeer. The animals were housed in individual stalls in a barn, and their nameplates identified them as Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, and Rudolph.

Photo Credit: North Pole, NY

But a scary moment followed when I left the barn and entered a petting zoo. An angry white goat chased me in the ring, nipping at my heels and chomping at my butt. I fell and became terrified the goat would chew my face off. My father laughed, picked me up, and shook off the dust that had covered my blue jeans.

An age appropriate image for the story.

Later, when it was my time to sit on Santa’s lap, I said to the older man wearing the fake white beard and red suit, “Listen, Santa, I have to tell you something.”

“Go on, young man,” he said.

“One of your goats was not very nice. He chased me and tried to bite me.”

“Oh, I’m very sorry to hear that,” Santa said. “I’ll go to the barn later and have a word with him. I promise you that won’t happen again.”

“Thank you, Santa,” I said and then proceeded to give him my Christmas wishes.

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The North Pole visit was one of our last vacations as a nuclear family. My parents would divorce a few years later.

Now, when I work on nonfiction and memoir projects, I find it mysterious and blessed how one little thing—such as seeing the Red One—can trigger a sense of recall, starting the movie projector running within your personal memory vault. It’s like all the scenes from our past are still tucked inside, and we just need a way to access them. For me, the key is trying to remember the sensory details from a particular incident or time period.

I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.