Perception of Santa

This year was Jared's first time meeting Santa. Every previous year I thought he was too young and would get freaked out sitting on someone's lap, and besides, who wants to stand in line that long to get a picture of your child sobbing on a stranger's lap?

Well, this year Santa showed up to an extended family Christmas party. When Jared saw him he asked, "Is that the real Santa? From the North Pole?" Well, I hesitated for a second and then replied, "No, Jared. That isn't the real Santa. That is just somebody pretending to be Santa." And then I added as a quick cover up, "The real Santa is at the North Pole making toys!" I think my real motivation behind that answer was not to tell the truth (or a partial truth), but to cover up in case that particular Santa freaked Jared out (which he didn't). I could also see Jared fixating on the idea that that particular Santa at that party was the real one and noticing that Santas at malls, etc., looked slightly different. I seriously wouldn't put it past him. Jared notices subtle things. (For example, when Alan saw the tools in his stocking this year Jared said, "Daddy, you bought those at Wal-mart!" and when Jared saw the big tool bench for him that was supposed to be from Santa he exclaimed, "This was in our basement!" Time to find a new and better hiding place, huh. And time to be more discreet when shopping.)

Well, Jared seemed to be fine with our explanation of Santa. It has certainly made an impression. Today I was looking at a friend's blog, and there was a picture of her little 3-year-old giving a human-sized Buzz a hug at Disney World. I said, "Jared, look! It's Buzz Lightyear!" to which Jared responded, "Mom, that's not really Buzz. That's just someone pretending to be Buzz." Smart kid.