The Real Santa

It has been three years since we sold our old home where our daughter was born. We love that home, it was our first. We also love our realtor, Joe Edwards, who helped sell that home. So when Joe invited us to a holiday party at his office, photos with Santa included, we all jumped in joy. Not that there is ever a Santa that is not nice, I felt that this particular Santa was especially nice. It helped that there wasn't a mile long line to see him. Our 6yr old also came to the same conclusion with some bold statements- "This Santa is even nicer than the mall Santa. I think he is the real Santa".

Later that night, she had a dinner/study/play date with her buddy, a boy couple of years her senior. During their dinner, I was eavesdropping as I almost always do (some mom I am!). She was bragging about her special Santa moment from the evening and her friend quickly interrupted- "You see, Santa is not real". She was completely stunned. Then said "No! He is real! He got me the Doll House I wanted last year!". "That wasn't Santa, that was your parents!", the boy shot back. There was pin drop silence for about five seconds before my daughter gave me the most incredibly puzzled look. I always knew this moment was coming but I did not realize it would get here right now. "Who do you think got you that Doll House?", I blurted out, with as much composure as I could muster. "SANTA" came the confident reply from her. "Well then, would you guys like some more Spaghetti?"

At bed time that night, I steered the conversation safely away from Santa and focused solely on the Chennai havoc the recent heavy rains there caused. I told her all about the rescue efforts in progress from across the world, including her own dance teacher's brilliant idea of raising money by selling homemade sambar (lentil soup). "But how is the sambar going to help those in Chennai if we eat it all up here", she asked incredulously. I said we would send them the money raised and not the sambar. "But where will they buy food from, all the Chennai stores must be in water too". After a few more of such very logical questions, I forced the conversation to conclude and kissed her goodnight.

The next morning, I pulled into work, still thinking about the best way to break the Santa reality to my daughter. On my distracted walk to the building, I found a shiny golden earring on the sidewalk. It did not have any rain damage, and looked like one that had recently separated from it's owner's ear. I handed the lone earring to the securitas, rushed to fab, and got absorbed into the humdrum of the work day. An hour later, while still in a fab meeting, I saw this coworker from the corner of my eye. I vaguely remembered seeing her earlier in the morning, walking back to her car just as I parked mine. It seemed odd, her walking back to the car when everyone else was walking to the building. At the time, I simply assumed she worked the night shift and was headed home. Seeing her in fab made it all fall in place in my mind. I excused myself from my meeting, walked over to her and asked her if she had lost an earring that morning. She was ecstatic! The earring was indeed hers, one of her favorites at that! She thanked me profusely, told me that I made her day and said many more wonderful things. She said it felt like an early Christmas present.

Just like that, she made me her Santa. Just like that, I figured out how to handle future Santa existence questions from my 6yr old.