Santa Story

Jesus and Santa get along well in our home. There is no conflict between them, and there need never be. I consider Santa to be God 1.0. It’s hard to explain God’s omniscience to a child. Easier to tell him or her that He, too, sees you when you’re sleeping and knows when you’re awake. And God’s omnipotence? Well, He knows if you’ve been bad or good, even in what you’re thinking. You get the idea.

So the fact that my kids believe in Santa? A good thing.

However. At about the age of six, the rumors begin to be whispered and passed. Santa isn’t real. It’s all a fake. There’s no magic. No sleigh. No nothing.

The rumors started early for my daughter: last year. Five years old and a full Santa believer, she came to me one night with news that a classmate had told her there was no Santa. Blasphemy, said my daughter. But in crept the doubts.

So I bought a Santa suit. Proof is in the seeing, after all. My children wanted to know without a doubt that Santa was real. What better way than to show them Santa? And not the fake one at the mall, either. The real one.

Fast forward to Christmas Eve. My wife and parents had been brought into the scheme. And a scheme it was. You’ve heard of Ocean’s 11? This was Coffey’s 4.

With my parents over for an innocent visit, my wife feigned a need for milk. I announced that I was going to the store, headed out the door, and charged straight for the backyard shed, where I had snuck the suit earlier (I had also snuck a gallon of milk into my truck. Pretty good, huh?). I changed quickly—pants, shirt, hat, beard, glasses, boots. A couple of strategically placed pillows and one cinched belt later, and I was in business.

The plan called for me to be on the porch at precisely seven o’clock. At 7:01, my wife would coax our two children into my son’s bedroom. They would see me on the porch, scream and yell and convulse, and Christmas would be saved.

What could go wrong?

Well. For one, my wife lost track of the time. And since the Santa suit had the thickness of a wet paper towel, I started to get a little chilly. The ramifications of this will become apparent shortly.

For another, once the kids were in the bedroom, they didn’t see me. The window shade was pulled up, the curtains were pulled back, and the porch light was on. And they still didn’t see me. So there I stood, arms waving and jumping up and down, to no avail. My wife finally asked what that noise from the porch was, which finally brought their attention to both the window and me.

The color drained from their faces. They stood silent. Immobile. Their jaws were frozen open, with slobber bubbles poking from their mouths.

I waved. And then they screamed. A joyful, rapturous scream.

Yes.

My daughter yelled, “Let’s go outside and see him!!” Both children bolted from the room.

Uh-oh.

My wife and I looked at each other through the bedroom window. We were both thinking the same thing—at a distance, I was a pretty good Santa. Up close, I didn’t have a chance. And once the kids hit the porch, they would no doubt see that my truck was still in the driveway and that I was not at the store buying milk. My kids were not as dumb as their father. They would know something was up.

All this was summed up in one word that my wife mouthed through the window.

Run, she said.

So I did.

But remember, I was a little chilly. Which meant that I was not as agile as I would normally be. So when I took off to jump over the railing of the porch, I didn’t quite make it. I tripped and fell headlong into the flower bed. Quickly recovering, I dashed around the side of the house and almost tackled the neighbor’s Labrador retriever. I got a nasty growl as a hello, and for a moment I could see this headline: Dog Eats Santa-Children Emotionally Scarred For Life.

I jumped up, rubbed the dog on the head for an apology, and dove back into the shed. Meanwhile, my parents had corralled the kids in the living room and prevented them from flying out the door and ruining everything.

Five minutes later, I walked through the front door, milk in hand, to the news that Santa, the real Santa, had been spotted at our house.

When the day comes that my children know the truth about all of this, this is what I will tell them: We’re all Santa. We’re all givers of gifts and shiners of light. We’re all here to make the world a better place, to spread joy and peace and happiness. But for now, I say let the rumors come. Let people tell my kids there is no Santa. They know better. They’ve seen him.

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