I Still Believe in Santa (and You Should Too)

It was 2006. My almost 10-year-old stepson Michael had been skeptical of the jolly old elf for the past couple of years.

You could tell in subtle ways. The letter to Santa didn't go in the mailbox until just a few days before Christmas. Then the next year, he asked for the impossible-to-find toy. Somehow, improbably, he was always surprised and delighted on Christmas morning.

But that year was the ultimate test.

"I don't want anything to play with this year. I want actual bells from his sleigh."

The gauntlet had been thrown down with just a couple of weeks' worth of notice.

Laurah and I have always thought of the Santa Charade as a game. The longer you play, the more you feel like you've won, but at that time, we thought we were pretty well cooked. The Internet was not what it is today, and there was no Amazon Prime to deliver these things to our doorsteps. What was available online was way too expensive and too new-to-be-convincing sleighbells.

It wouldn't work. The jig was up.

My big family Christmas party is traditionally the Sunday before the holiday. We talked with a couple of my aunts about Michael and how he had given us the ultimate test that year. With a grimace and a shrug, the game was over. Until it wasn't...

"Oh, I have sleighbells."

Wait, what?

My stepmom overheard our conversation and chimed in at the perfect time. Apparently, a friend of hers had horses and a barn full of stuff like that. Arrangments were made, and just like that, we had a holiday miracle on our hands.

When you write something like this down, it seems so insignificant. The truth is, there's something so much bigger at work. My wife and I were trying so hard to give our kid a reason to keep believing in something that he desperately wanted to, despite the convincing (and mounting) evidence to the contrary. Our own belief that we could keep up our end of the deal had waned to the point that we had all but given up. Then magic literally happened.

It was a Christmas miracle, and I declared at that moment that I would forever believe in Santa Claus.

As Michael has grown older, he usually comes and stays with us over Christmas. On Christmas Eve, he takes a walk in the neighborhood with that strap of sleighbells, jingling them just loudly enough that sleepy toddlers think they may have heard them. How's that for Christmas magic?

My 13-year-old daughter learned the truth about the mechanics of the situation and has done everything she can to keep faith alive for Buster, who we think has got it all figured out now but so desperately wants to keep the magic somehow alive.

That's the thing about magic, though; you don't want to believe that it's not true.

But isn't it? Isn't it magic how a kid's eyes light up when they think of a fairy tale? Is that not real?

And isn't that the point?

It was a little more than 30 years ago when I had "the talk" with my Dad (no, not that talk). He reminded me that I had two little brothers and I had a responsibility not to wreck the magic for them. He told me that there was more to Santa Claus than a fat delivery guy in a red suit. I listened, I appreciated, and I paid it forward.

Sixteen years later, Michael did the same. Another 16 years later, Allyson has too. It will not surprise me when Buster does the same next year for his cousins and the other young people in our lives.

That's the Santa Claus I believe in. The spirit of thinking beyond yourself, making sure that others are taken care of whenever you can, and the occasional holiday miracle as well.

Regardless of the holiday you're celebrating right now (or not), I wish you and yours peace, love, success, and a little bit of magic.

I wish you and yours all of the joy, love, and good fortune that this season can bring. Cheers!