by D.A. Marshall

Created on: July 20, 2009

I think I may have elf blood coursing through my veins, for Christmas has always been really special to me. Not because of the presents I would receive or all the wonderful food that my mother, grandmothers, and aunts would spend days preparing. No, it was the prospect of getting a sneek peek at The Man Himself, Santa Claus. I wanted to see the kind face of the man who loved children so much, he spent his entire year making presents for all good children, and then spent a whole night flying around in a sleigh to distribute these gifts. My dad had woven tales of that wonderful soul from the very moment I was able to understand such kindness.

Now, let me give you an idea of how my very stern and strict father suddenly became a fun-loving, animated, and very secretive person shortly after Thanksgiving. He would begin by making sure both my brother and I were able to immediately visit with the fake Santa at Sears Roebuck and Co. Yeah, we knew he wasn't the Real Guy. He was one of Santa's helpers, of course. But we went along with it, just to give my parents the thrill of getting that free Polaroid instant photo of us both sitting on the guy's lap. Once this ordeal was over, we could get down to the real business of preparing for Christmas. We wrote letters to Santa, of course, every year, spelling out exactly what we would like to have for Christmas. We never had long, selfish lists as some of our friends did, we were always encouraged by our parents to figure out what one thing we really wanted, and write that down. My folks were the ones who took care of folding the letters and putting them into envelopes they helped us address.

A couple of weeks later, we suddenly were no longer allowed in my parents' bedroom without permission. It never occurred to us to ask why, we simply complied. Who were we to argue with our parents, running the risk of Santa hearing of our misbehavior? How would we deal with the horror of being the only kids in our neighborhood with no presents under the tree? During the Christmas season especially, we mustered all the effort we could to be model children. We took no unnecessary chances.

Closer to the Big Night, we and all the neighbor kids would talk incessantly, again, about what were we were gonna do since none of us had chimneys for Santa to drop down into. We lived in a fairly new neighborhood whose streets were lined with cookie cutter houses, and none of them had a fireplace. Someone came up with the idea that maybe he,

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