When I was four years' old, Santa Claus came to our house on Christmas Eve. Yeah, I know, he comes to everybody's house on Christmas Eve. At least, that's what they say. But here he is at MY house, talking with me and my little brother.
This picture kept me believing in Santa for years after the fact. When my friends would tell me that Santa was really just your parents, I could counter with, "No! I've seen him! He CAME to my house and talked to me! He's REAL!"
He was very convincing, that Santa. We wondered where his reindeer were. He told us that since there was no snow (after all, this was southern Arizona) he had to leave them in the mountains. He told us that he would have to come back after we were asleep and leave our gifts. Never before had two little children raced so quickly to get into bed early!
I didn't find out until I was an adult just exactly which of my parents' friends had played the part that night back in 1974.
I've debated how to approach the concept of Santa with our children. Tossing out Santa was not an option for me. There's too much magic involved! To not get to believe in Santa is to miss something truly beautiful about the world! But I also haven't felt comfortable about dragging on an outright lie for too, too long. I decided that once Dallin got to asking the real, hard questions, I would either tell him the truth or keep the story going, but in such a light-hearted, whimsical way that he would have to know I was joking. This worked really well when he delved into the authenticity of the Easter Bunny this past year. I felt that since Mr. Bunny was well on his way to being totally outed, Santa Claus must be next.
But then, something happened yesterday that will likely reverse my plans and keep Dallin believing in this guy
Dallin got a special letter in the mail from none other than... you guessed it! Santa Claus.
The return address, which got a little cut off when I scanned it, reads "Santa, No. Pole, The World". The text is as follows:
And we have NO clue who it's really from. No clue whatsoever. There are a few indiosyncracies which we've thoroughly analyzed: Santa spelled Dallin's name wrong. Santa wrote our last name in quotation marks. There is a mixture of cursive and print, lower case and ALL CAPS. I'm guessing it was an elderly person. I dunno, the script just looks very precise and careful, and it seems that young people today don't write that way. I know I don't. It's a good thing Dallin can't read that well yet and had no clue that the postmark says "Salt Lake City".
I must say, it's very sweet to think that someone is thinking of my little boy and wanting to do something special for him. Even if it did put a wrench in the natural progression of his learning reality in the easiest and smoothest way possible. But maybe that's a good thing. Maybe he needs a bit more magic for a few more years. Maybe it's better to believe.
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