SantaLand Diaries Read Online Free PDF Page B

yell what you want and I need you to say it as loud as you can.”
    Then he would count to three and the noise was magnificent. Santa would cover his ears and say, “Okay, then, — one by one want you to tell me what you’re planning to leave Santa on Christmas Eve.”
    He would go around the room and children would name different sorts of cookies, and he would say, “What about sandwiches: What if Santa should want something more substantial than a cookie?”
    Santa’s thrust this afternoon was the boredom of his nine-year relationship. He would wave the children good-bye and then turn to me, saying. “I want an affair, Goddamn it — just a little one, just something to get me through the next four or five years.”
     
    Some of these children, they get nervous just before going in to visit Santa. They pace and wring their hands and stare at the floor. They act like they’re going in for a job interview. I say, “Don’t worry, Santa’s not going to judge you. He’s very relaxed about that sort of thing. He used to be judgmental but people gave him a hard time about it so he stopped. Trust me, you have nothing to worry about.”
     
    I was Photo Elf tonight for the oldest Santa. Usually their names are written on the water cups they keep hidden away on the toy shelf. Every now and then a Santa will call out for water and an elf will hold the cup while his master drinks through a straw. I looked on the cup and saw no name. We were busy tonight and I had no time for an introduction. This was an outstanding Santa, wild but warm. The moment a family leaves, this Santa, sensing another group huddled upon his doorstep, will begin to sing.
    He sings, “A pretty girl … is like a melody.”
    The parents and children enter the room, and if there is a girl in the party, Santa will take a look at her, hold his gloved hands to his chest, and fake a massive heart attack — falling back against the cushion and moaning with a combination of pleasure and pain. Then he slowly comes out of it and says, “Elf, Elf … are you there?”
    “Yes, Santa, I’m here.”
    “Elf, I just had a dream that I was standing before the most beautiful girl in the world. She was right here, in my house.”
    Then I say, “It wasn’t a dream, Santa. Open your eyes, my friend. She’s standing before you.”
    Santa rubs his eyes and shakes his head as if he were a parish priest, visited by Christ. “Oh, heavenly day,” he says, addressing the child. “You are the most beautiful girl I have seen in six hundred and seventeen years.”
    Then he scoops her into his lap and flatters every aspect of her character. The child is delirious. Santa gestures toward the girl’s mother, asking, “Is that your sister I see standing there in the corner
    “No, that’s my mother.”
    Santa calls the woman over close and asks if she has been good mother. “Do you tell your daughter that you love her? I you tell her every day?”
    The mothers always blush and say, “I try, Santa.”
    Santa asks the child to give her mother a kiss. Then he addresses the father, again requesting that he tell the child how much he loves her.
    Santa ends the visit, saying, “Remember that the most important thing is to try and love other people as much as they love you.
    The parents choke up and often cry. They grab Santa’s hand and, on the way out, my hand. They say it was worth the wait. The most severe cases open their wallets and hand Santa a few bucks. We’re not supposed to accept tips, but most Santas take the money and wink, tucking it into their boot. This Santa looked at money as if it were a filthy Kleenex. He closed his eyes and prepared for the next family.
    With boys, this Santa plays on their brains: each one is smartest boy in the world.
    The great thing about this Santa is that he never even asks what the children want. Most times he involves the parents to the point where they surrender their urge for documentation. They lay down their video recorders