There, you’ve been warned. But because people ignore printed instructions all the time, I’m gonna put it behind a cut. Just in case.

Many years ago, when my daughters were in third and fourth grades, respectively, they came to me and said they had to ask me a very serious question. They were extremely, and uncharacteristically, somber and I was really worried. Had someone hurt them? Was someone sick? Did something bad happen at their dad’s house? (In true Mother Fashion, all these thoughts and more blazed through my brain in about five seconds…)

They hauled me into my bedroom and shut the door. They sat on the edge of my bed and said, “We need to know something, and we’re asking you because we know you will tell us the truth.”

This was simultaneously the most flattering and frightening thing anyone has ever said to me, so I gulped and said, “Okay….what’s up?”

Lane hesitated and said, “Kids at school are saying that Santa Claus isn’t real, and we need you to tell us whether that’s true or not.” Abby was silent, but looked apprehensive.

Oh.

Now, this was complicated because I had, every other time a younger kid asked the question, answered with a fully-confident, resounding “YES.” This was going to have to be handled a little more delicately.

I explained that you can’t prove a negative, and so you can’t prove that Santa doesn’t exist; you could only prove that he does. An inability to prove he exists does not automatically mean that he doesn’t. (This is so like me, to work a little philosophy into the conversation; mercifully, the girls understood that.)

I took a deep breath and said, “Of course Santa’s real. I should know, because *I’m* Santa. And I’m real.”

The secret to the Santa Experience is this: BEING Santa is more fun than getting gifts from Santa. And when a zillion adults are running around trying to be Santa, well, I don’t see how anyone can say that Santa doesn’t exist. Discussions centered around about how he can’t exist are merely ignoring the quantum and philosophical possibilities. In fact, the use of parents and other grownups to serve as a gigantic gift delivery system for one man is a brilliantly low-tech solution worthy of an Amway Double Diamond Distributor.

The girls were pleased with this explanation, and were satisfied that I had not been lying my head off in previous discussions.

Some parents, of course, choose to never introduce a gift to a child that is putatively from ‘Santa.’ The most common reason is that they don’t want to start off their relationship with their child with a lie. I understand. Some parents refrain from the Santa Experience because they don’t want to confuse the more important religious aspects of the holiday with the secular ones.

Another, less- common-but-gaining-in-popular-use reason is that the parent doesn’t want some non-existent being to get credit for giving the gift. They, the parents, have done the work, they reason, and they want the credit with the kid.

Seriously. As an even more editorial comment than the other comments offered here:  I understand where you’re coming from, but to the casual observer, nothing could sound more insecure. You may not *be* insecure, but that sure sounds like it.

There are, of course, many more discussion points around the whole Santa Experience. We’ll save those for another day. For now, I have to get my one tiny reindeer basset hound ready for some present shopping.

© E.S. Evans 2010