Santa Survives the Pandemic

I saw him from across the park and thought it might be him.  But it wasn’t until he slid onto the bench on the opposite side of the picnic table, at the other end, appropriately distanced and masked, that I knew for sure.  His eyes gave him away.  I’d given up on seeing Santa this year.

“I thought it might be you.  How did you find me?”

“Come on McClure, I’m Santa.  I know things.”

“You know things about kids.  I’m 69.  Not a kid any longer.”

“You are to me.  Seems like yesterday I was landing the sleigh on your parent’s farmhouse between Bloomington and Pekin.  Big white house, but the barn was taller.  Had to come in from the east.  Do you remember that cowboy outfit?  Boots?  Fake pinto horsehide vest?  Silvery tin cap guns in double holsters?”

“Oh God, I do now.  I was maybe six years old.  That would be 1957. I’d almost forgotten.  You’re showing off Santa, you really do remember everything.  What are you doing here?”

“Trying to stay relevant.  It’s been a tough year.  Even for an immortal myth like me.”

After I swim laps at the YMCA I sometimes swing by the river walk along the Fox.  I get out of the car and sit at the same picnic table near the splash pad.  Swimming is the only consistent activity I have, and most days the lap swimmers in the pool and the lifeguards are the only people I have contact with besides my wife.

It was a few days before Christmas.  I was sitting at that picnic table to clear my head, or better said to open it up.  2020 has been a god-awful year.  Some days I feel like I’ve lost a chunk of my life.  Watching the river go by like nothing has happened is comforting.  This day slivers of ice were forming by the bank.

“You don’t look like you’re doing so good McClure.”

Santa is not usually that blunt.  I took a long look at him.  He was wearing bib overalls.  He thinks he blends in when he does that.  The mask didn’t cover his beard.  He’s a different person when he’s not in costume. 

“As a matter of fact, neither do you big guy.  What happened to that twinkle in your eye?  The old Ho Ho Ho?”

He didn’t respond.

“And you’re still not telling me why you’re in Ottawa.”

“Well, I snuck in to do an event, you know, like I do sometimes.  I blend in with the fake Santas.  It helps keep me on my game, being up close and personal with kids and their parents.

“Somebody at Opportunity School asked me to show up for what they called a “Drive By” event.  I’ve helped them before. In the past, they have set me up in a nice chair in front of the fireplace in the library.  I talk to the kids as a group, then individually.  It’s one of the nicest gigs I’ve ever done.  And they seem to like it.“

“So how was it?”

“So different.  I mean, they were glad to see me., and surprised.  Except for the ones who are afraid and hide their eyes, but that happens.  We talked.  But it wasn’t close.  I tried to talk with my eyes, like veiled Arabic women do, but how much came through I don’t know.  They wear their masks well, those kids, better than some adults. But it muffles their little voices.  I have enough trouble hearing them when they talk right into my ear.”

Santa was wound up.

“And no touch.  I stood on the curb, they stayed in the car.  I passed candy canes through the open window.  Some of the parents tried to get pictures.”

He shook his head.

“It’s not only that they couldn’t be close to me; they couldn’t be with each other. Their school is closed because of the virus and the teachers are doing all they can to keep them engaged. They gave their students bags of small presents and activities.  And the parents gave the teachers presents too.

But the kids are not only separated from their teachers; they are separated from their classmates.  And being with each other-playing, sharing, working things out-is the most important part of Opportunity School.  They’re missing it.”

Santa looked across to the far riverbank rising above the water.  I felt like I needed to say something.

“You’ve been through this before right?  I mean Polio in the 1950’s, the Spanish Flu in 1918, hell the plague in Europe.  What was it, Black Death?  That started in the 1340’s and wiped out a third of the population of Europe.  You were around for that right?”

“Sure, I was there for all that.  My myth goes back to 280 A.D..  That’s 1,740 years of history.  I’m not saying I haven’t seen waves of death and disruption like this before, but this one really slapped me in the face.”

I love it when Santa talks about the old days.

“The world was so much smaller when the plague hit, and so less equipped to respond.  They couldn’t communicate well, they didn’t understand science, people were illiterate, they had no medicines to speak of.  The world was a whole different place.  And I was just flying a small delivery loop starting in Scandinavia down to the Mediterranean coast and into Turkey.  Tiny group of believers then, my story was only spread by word of mouth.  The job of being Santa was so simple.”

“Where are you going with this Santa?”

He looked down at the top of the picnic table.  The city paints them green every year, coat after coat of glossy green paint.  Then he looked up.

“Your country has messed this pandemic up so badly.  You’re the richest, most developed country in the world.  You have the capacity to do anything.  You’re not the best country mind you, but you have such potential.  Do you know you have 5% of the world’s population and yet you’ve suffered 19% of all the deaths from Covid?  338,501 deaths. “

Santa shook his head.

“So unnecessary.  So unhinged.  You’ve bungled testing and contact tracing.  Your infection rate, because of Christmas celebrations, WHICH I AM THE SYMBOL OF, BY THE WAY, is going to go through the roof in January.  You are spreading disease in my name.  I feel complicit.  The worst is likely ahead for you screwy Americans.  And you want me to smile and be jolly?  You want me to make Christmas merry?”

He was by now raising his voice and pointing his finger at me as he made his points.  I’d never seen Santa angry.  He was losing it, totally out of character. 

“Yeah, Santa.  As a matter of fact, we do.  You think I can control it?  You think those kids and their parents at Opportunity School, or their teachers, are part of the problem?  They’re not.  We’re all victims in this.”

I’d gotten him to listen at least. 

“It’s a virus Santa, and ironically America’s freedoms and our sense of entitlement have made it worse.  Yes, we’ve had terrible leadership.  Yes, we bungled it from the start.  You’re right.  We should have done much better.  But what do we do now?  We’re replacing the head of our government.  Give us credit for that.  We’re trying to turn this around.  You going to help us?  Or are you going to be part of the problem?”

Santa was looking straight at me.  I thought I saw tears in his big old blue eyes.  He let out a big sigh and responded.

“You know what I’m going to do.  I’m going to go out there and promote the spirit of Christmas.  It’s my identity.  It’s why I exist.”

He hung his head.  I gave him my handkerchief.  He pulled down his mask and gave his red nose a big blow.

“Now tell me something good that’s happened.”

 I felt like I was doing youth counseling again, but with a 1,740 year old man.

“Come on.  It’s never all bad.  Tell me something good.”

Santa leaned back, took a big breath, looked up at the sky.

“I’ve got this group of young elves up at the North Pole.  Always on the computer.  They figured since we can’t promote seeing Santa in person, because it draws crowds and promotes more infection, we could do it through technology.  They come up with the idea of “Santa on Zoom.”

“Great idea.”

“They fix up a corner of the workshop as a sort of studio, decide on a camera angle, put some colored lights behind me, and we book some dates.  They teach me the basics, when to mute people, how to look into the camera, and we start.”

He smiles for the first time since he sat down at the picnic table.

“The first session we do is an extended family, multiple kids at four or five sites.  Everybody talks at once.  I try to talk to one kid at a time and others interrupt.  They disappear from the screen, reappear, I don’t know what I’m doing, I fake it, do the Ho Ho Ho’s.”

“OK, and what did they think of it?”

“They loved it.  I don’t know why.”

“Go on.  Tell me about another one.”

“We connected with a family of five.  Mom and Dad on either end of a big couch.  Their kids in between-ages 7, 5, and almost 3.   It started really well.  They were in awe to see me on screen, and I talked back, saying their names.  I knew about them of course and started asking personalized questions.  That impressed them.”

“You’re good at that.”

“But the youngest boy, almost three, figured out how the camera worked and began to hog it.  I was talking to the 7 year-old boy about football, and the young kid interrupted, put his face in front of the camera, blocking everything else out, and told me in a loud voice he was leaving me cookies.  His brother was so patient with him.  Really admirable.”

“And?”

“And then the middle child, a girl, found this basket of nerf balls, maybe big cotton balls, and began throwing them at her brothers.  And they of course threw them back. “

‘Snowballs!’ I said, and they all began to laugh. 

They settled down some and I asked if they had any questions.  They always ask about the reindeer. They listened.  It ended well.  I have a whole new respect for teachers doing remote instruction.”

“How about one more good thing?”

“The elves got a request from the grandma of a five-year-old.  Seemed intent on getting her grandson to see Santa.  We booked it and the camera opened up to this sweet little guy sitting by his mother, a little nervous, but very curious.  We connected with each other right away.

I think I finally learned not to look at him on the screen but instead look right into the camera.  It wasn’t the same as being in person of course, but our eyes met and we seemed to click.  As we talked, he got more comfortable.  He told me about a present he was giving his mom and got excited.  That’s always a good sign, kids who clue into the joy of giving.

And then he did something I would never have thought of.  He insisted on a picture with Santa and showed his Mom how he wanted it done.  He held the tablet on his lap, filled with my face.  His camera swings around and I see the grandma.  She’s taking a picture of her grandson, holding a screen on his lap, with my image on the screen.  A digital image of me thousands of miles away, in his living room.  I haven’t seen the picture, but I imagine him with a big smile.”

“So, it worked,” I said.

“Yeah, in its own weird way it worked.”

“You know what they say don’t you Santa?”

“What?”

“Even old myths can learn new tricks.”

“Stop pulling my leg McClure.  It’s a poor substitute for being present in real life.”

“But you did your job.  You brought hope and joy to that little boy on Christmas, just like you used to do for me.”

“Yeah, I guess I did after all.”

“This might be a new thing for you Santa.”

“God, I hope not.  I just want things to go back to the way they were.”

“Hey, speaking of God, do you ever talk to him?”

“No.  I’ve told you this before, we’re in a different league, God and I.”

“OK.  Well, how far does this deal of you knowing things about me go?”

“What do you mean?”

"I mean, do you know my future?”

“Like what?”

“Like how much time I have left here among the living?”

“Why are you asking me this McClure?”

“Because I have things I want to get done, and it would help a lot to know how much time I had to do them.  I’ve never been a big planner, but I’d at least like to set some realistic goals.  Hard to do if don’t have a time frame you know?”

“McClure, I know for a fact you used to have to make up these kinds of plans for work.  Five-year plans, that kind of thing.  Tell me, how accurate were those plans?”

“They weren’t worth a shit, Santa.  Wild ass guesses at best.”

“You couldn’t have planned for this pandemic and the mess it would cause in a million years, could you?”

“I guess not.”

“So, my standard advice is to do what you want most right now.  Don’t wait.  You mortals have a bad habit of procrastinating, and then dying.  I don’t have that problem.  You do.”

I looked over at the river, still flowing by.  I knew he was right.

“You’re talking about your book, right?  Stop screwing around and get it done.  You’ll feel better.  And then do the same with the other things you want to do but find ways to avoid.”

“So, do you think we’ll talk again next year?”

“Let’s plan on it.  Thanks for the chat, McClure.  I needed someone to talk to.”

“We all do Santa.  Thanks for being you.”

“Don’t get all sentimental on me, McClure.  I've got to get out of here.  I have places to go, things to do, and people to see.  So do you.  But do one more thing for me, will you?”

“What’s that?”

“Have a Merry Christmas, and a damned good New Year.”

“Thanks, Santa.  You too.  Things will be different next year.”

“Yep. Thanks for reminding me. They always are.”

And with that, he walked away.  Santa and the spirit of Christmas found me at a picnic table.  I hope he found you too.  Merry Christmas.  Cherish this new year by making it your best yet.