Santa Magic

At Mah Jongg today my friends were looking at a picture on Facebook of another friend’s child who was just not happy to be visiting Santa. That got us reminiscing about our own histories with meeting the jolly ‘ole elf and those of our children. My friend Christy and I shared our favorite Santa situations. Christy’s son Trey and Carter are the same age and have grown up in the same neighborhood their whole lives. No wonder that they both visited the same Santa as their first experience.

We used to have a mall called South Square right near us. It was not the best shopping experience and has been torn down long ago and replaced with a Target. Although the shops were sad there the Christmas experience for the kids as top notch. First there was a whole chorus of singing bears, not big scary bears, but toddler sized bears a la teddy Ruxpin Iike guys and they were animatronic so they not only sang, but moved too. At the caroling bear show there were dozens of tiny red and green wooden chairs and Carter would sit for hours playing with the chairs and singing with the bears.

Christy reported that Trey too loved the bears and since we were mothers of toddlers we both remembered spending hours of time watching the bears during the dark days of December when we had two year olds. Although our kids liked the bear show, neither seemed that interested in Santa. Carter was quite suspicious of the old man in the red suit and cried her eyes out before I made her sit on his lap. Really that was good instinct on her part to be fearful of strangers. Despite her initial fear that Santa had some kind of magic because after she was quite gleeful.

Christy said that Trey too would not go sit with Santa despite her visiting him everyday, just to listen to the bears. One day when the Santa line was really slow and Trey was the only kid in the Mall the Santa got off his big Santa throne and went and sat with Trey on the tiny toddler chairs in front of the singing bears. After Trey had gotten used to Santa he pulled out the book “T’was the night before Christmas” and read the whole thing to tiny Trey. That was it. Trey had made a new friend in Santa. For the rest of the holiday season when Trey would come through the Mall for his daily visit to the bears, Santa would call out to him, “Hi Trey!” And they both would wave at each other.

I don’t know where that Santa went after South Square closed but I hope that he continued to be well employed. He was the best representative of what Santa can be for children, the nice guy who loves you and makes you feel safe and special. I hope that all children everywhere have someone in their life that makes them feel that way. They may not remember the exact moment it happens, but I think the magic stays with them, at least it did stay with the mothers.