Here Comes Santa Claus

Not that many of them could, anyway. But just in case there are a few young phonetically geared wizards out there, I don't want to spoil Christmas for them. Because today I am going to discuss one of the greatest lies of our childhood: Santa Claus.

I still remember the day my mother broke the news to me and said that Santa was only a myth.

"I thought he was a myth-ter," I said.

"No. A myth," Mom explained, "is like a legend, an amazing story that's been told about someone down through the years, but it turns out it's not a true story."

"In other words," I said, helping Mom through this tragic parental ordeal she was suffering, "there's no Santa Claus."

"Bingo!"

It came as no surprise. Like most children who had reached the age of reason, I was finding that the fable of the jolly fat man from the North Pole was getting harder and harder to swallow with each passing Christmas season.

As children growing up in a holiday-minded town in Iowa, my friends and I were well schooled in the Santa doctrine. We were firm believers in old Kris Kringle and the "naughty or nice" routine kept us on the straight and narrow. For parents, it was like having an imaginary cop to keep their kids in line for at least the better part of five weeks.

We could always tell if a department store Santa Claus was the real deal or not. This gift of instant identification came easily for

As I recall it, Santa Claus hung out in the entrance to a particular downtown store every Wednesday and Friday afternoon in December. As soon as school let out on those days, we raced the two blocks to Anthony's Department Store and there he was, handing out giant-sized Milky Way candy bars.

We instantly decided that this was THE Santa Claus. It was like staring into the face of a prophet. His suit, his beard, his sleighside manner were perfect. And the candy bars were free!

There were other Santas in other stores who were merely cheap imitations, not even fit to sweep reindeer poop off Rudolph's stable floor. The actors weren't fat enough, their suits didn't fit and their belly laughs lacked spirit. Frankly, their "ho-ho-ho-ing" had less ho's than a red light district.

One fellow who tried to pass as Santa Claus left his post outside of a store and crossed the street to the courthouse square where he, in full view of us kiddies, wandered into a public restroom. That did it for us!

"He's not the real Santa Claus," we agreed. "Everyone knows that Santa doesn't pee."

Probably the most entertaining Santa from my childhood was in another Iowa town. That community had a street corner Claus who rang a bell and gleefully handed out penny candies to passing children.

This Santa was portrayed by the son of one of the city policemen and he was so gleeful because he'd had a good snootful of whiskey prior to reporting for duty. That explained why his season's greeting was loud and slurred and sounded like "Mrrry Clissy."

I know it was tough on my mother when she had to tell me there was really no Santa Claus. Years later, it was just as difficult for me to explain to my sons that the "jolly old elf" was a fabrication.

Although we walk our children through the Santa ritual to create for them joy and happiness in the Christmas season (and I would never go back and change that) I still managed to feel as though a trust had been broken between parent and child when it came time to own up to the fact that Santa was merely an invention.

When the day of reckoning had arrived for my oldest son, he was shattered.

"And there's no Easter Bunny?" he asked.

"No, son."

"And no tooth fairy?" he continued.

"No," I told him. Then, after careful thought, I said, "And you know those stories we've been telling you about God?"

"WHAAATTT? NO GOD, EITHER?"

"Just kidding," I said. I reassured him that all was well with the Man Upstairs.

Even today I ponder the Santa Claus story and God. In a world of war and poverty, struggle and grief, hate and hardship, I'm still amazed that, as adults, we continue to nurture an incredible faith in things unseen considering how that absolutely wondrous and fanciful part of the Christmas dreams of our childhood turned out to be a mere legend.