The Magic of Christmas

So I promised that I would be terrible at this blogging business, and I do try to always hold forth on my promises. However, I've been remembering something magical that happened to me as a child and in the hopes of preserving the wonder of Christmas I thought I'd set it down in writing, here. The story I am about to tell is told exactly as I remember it happening. I know that most of you will laugh and that is fine with me. But those that know me well know I believe in this event with my whole heart and if you set out to convince me of the impossibility of Santa, you will not succeed.

Christmas as a child was magical for me, as it is for almost all children. I'd say I was about 4 and it was probably our last Christmas in the first house I ever remember living in. The house was a typical ranch style house, one story, and it was centered around the living room. My parents room was off of one side of the living room, and the two other rooms were on the opposite side. Grandma was sleeping in the guest room, and I had been put to bed in my own with the usual plea that I had to quickly go to sleep because Santa wouldn't come until and unless I was sleeping. I awoke at some time in the middle of the night and decided, as was often my custom, to go crawl into bed with Grandma. I slipped out of bed and started to walk into the living room and was stopped dead in my tiny tracks by a man in a red coat with his back to me, sitting on the floor and leaning up against our couch. He had white hair on the back of his head, and the top was bald. A red hat sat behind him on the couch and he was wrapping presents. Two thoughts ran through my head. The first being surprise at the fact Santa was wrapping presents himself, the second was sheer and utter terror. All my short life I'd been told that if Santa saw you he wouldn't leave you presents and I was convinced he would KNOW. He is Santa, after all. I rushed back to my bed, crawled under my covers, sure that at any minute Santa would come into my room and be mad that I had seen him. He never did, and I fell asleep trying to figure out how in the world I would explain to my parents the next morning why I had no Santa gifts.

The next morning I woke early and creeped into the living room to a wondrous sight. Presents abounded (or at least they seemed to my 4 year old eyes). There were the usual presents from my parents, and a few special presents from Santa, all wrapped in the paper I'd seen Santa himself using.

My parents know the story and I'm sure they've never believed that it was anything other than the fanciful imaginings of a kid. Let it be known that my Dad is not a chubby half bald, white haired man who is in the habit of dressing as Santa on Christmas Eve. Let it also be known that everyone who has heard my story thinks I'm a little loopy, with the possible exception of my husband (who thinks I'm loopy for reasons completely unrelated.) It is quite possible that I dreamed this, but it didn't feel like a dream I'd ever had before, or have ever since had. It was, in its purest most unadulterated form, magic. A magic that I clung to my entire childhood and well into adulthood, and that I fervently hope I can instill in my daughter.

This year we will bake cookies and set them out for Santa, with a note asking him to please remember that we are in Texas this year and not at our house. We will set out sugar cubes for the reindeer, and then we will dress in our Christmas jammies and talk about Santa coming down our chimney with his sack full of gifts. And as I lie in bed that night I will probably lay awake, straining my ears for the small possibility that I might hear Santa on my roof. If I just happen to rush downstairs first to see if Santa ate our cookies, it is only because a part of my heart will always believe in miracles.

I can't pretend to know what happened to me that Christmas Eve but I have seen countless miracles in my life since that day. As I celebrate my own special miracle's 2nd Christmas, I will be reminded yet again that for me, the bell will always ring.