Santa Went Down to Georgia

Somewhere in Georgia. The gas station pump had a TV in it. All gas station pumps have TVs now.

If you buy gas in America, you have to watch loud commercials, selling everything from smartphone apps to foot powder. And in true TV-commercial fashion, the ads are roughly the same volume as a nuclear weapons field test.

So there I was, pumping gas, trying to ignore the ad for hemorrhoid cream, when I noticed a car pull beside me. It was an old-model Nissan. Lots of rust. Dings everywhere. The car made more noise than a tambourine salesman riding on railroad tracks.

A guy stepped out. He was big and portly. He wore a thick white beard. The tips of his mustache were waxed. He wore red, from his head to his foot. His eyes, how they twinkled. His dimples how merry. His radio was playing “Hotel California” by the Eagles.

He stood beside me, pumping gas, checking his phone, and he saw me looking at him.

“Hi,” he said.

I could not find the words. “Are you…?”

He nodded.

“You mean the real…?” I said.

Nod.

He was on his way to Atlanta for a gig. He would be visiting a group foster home. I asked what it would be like, visiting all those kids.

He shrugged. “They’ll sit on my lap. They’ll tell me what they want. They’ll ask if they can pull my beard. I’ll give them a candy cane.”

“Is it real?”

“I don’t use fake candy canes.”

“I meant your beard.”

“One hundred percent Santa.”

I asked what sorts of things kids in orphangaes request for Christmas. He said it’s been the same wishlist every year. Only the names of the children change.

“Last year,” he said, “a little boy asked if I could ask God to let his mother into heaven after her overdose.

“I had a girl cry on my shoulder and beg me to adopt her because she said nobody wanted her.

“One time, a little girl gave me her list and all it said on it was, ‘food.’ The police found her starving before she went into foster care.”

I asked how the Big Guy got into this particular business.

“I had a career when I was younger, I was in insurance.”

Santa, selling insurance policies. Ho, ho, deductible.

“…One day a guy at work asked if I’d be Santa at his kid’s school party. I rented a costume. I grew my beard out. It changed me. It was the most rewarding experience of my life. After that, there was no going back.”

Several years ago, he retired early. Although he’s quick to point out that insurance agents never retire. They expire.

He doesn’t make much money, but he travels all over, doing his thing. He’s been doing it 29 years, and there is no conceivable end in sight. “I’ll do it until Mrs. Claus has to start changing my diapers.”

When he finished pumping gas, he screwed on the filler cap and crawled into his rusted Altima. He looked at me through the rolled-down window.

I asked a question. “Is there anything specific YOU want for Christmas, Santa?”

“Yessir,” he said. “Same thing I want every year. I want kids to know Santa loves them. But I want them to know Santa’s boss loves them even more.”

1 comment

  1. stephen e acree - November 30, 2023 4:08 pm

    I had to discuss Santa each year in my classes. I taught Elem PE. So the younger ones would bring up his existence. I assured them that I believed. I told them the story when I was six and woke up to a noise in the living room. I chckd my parents room and they were asleep (I was a night person) and then chckd the living room and it was full of gifts and toys. THATS when I knew. This was Pulaski Tenn in 1961. I watch Miracle on 34th st each year along with Its A Wonderful Life and usually cry. Christmas is much more than the myths. Its about caring, love and giving. Its as real as dirt and the one time many people actually seem to care about others.

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