He also knows what a good sport you were about early-morning
soccer practices all fall and which pet you brought to the Old Home Day pet
contest. If you happen to be in third grade this year, he even knows which
tribe you covered for your Native American project.
I know this because within the 01741 zip code, I’m Santa’s
letter-writing adviser. The other eleven months of the year, I write newspaper
articles under my own name and also ghost-write for a variety of clients who
have plenty to say but don’t enjoy putting pen to paper themselves. But when
December comes, I get to work with my favorite “ghost-writing” client of all,
St. Nicholas himself.
I hope no one will be shocked to hear that Santa utilizes a
professional consultant. When he approached me for help, it didn’t seem any more
unusual than any of my other clients asking for assistance with writing. If you
are the CEO of a biosciences company, a former NFL quarterback who wants to
reminisce about Super Bowls past, or a doctor who knows how to perform surgery
but not necessarily how to explain it in terms that make people flock to your
office door -- to use just a few examples from my current client list -- you
hire a writer to help with your materials. And if your expertise lies in
overseeing a toy-making operation and flying a sleigh, there’s nothing to be
ashamed of in recruiting some professional help when it comes to writing
letters.
The first time I worked for Santa, I thought it would be
easy. Santa’s reason for hiring locally rather than outsourcing to far-off
countries where editorial labor is far cheaper is that he values familiarity
with the local demographic. And that I have. Sure, he knows everyone by name
and general behavioral profile, but he doesn’t have those intricate connections
that those of us within small towns enjoy. When we opened his mailbox last year
and the letters flooded out, there was hardly a name I didn’t recognize. Kids
all over Carlisle had written to Santa, and happily for Santa, I knew most of
them even better than he did.
That turned out to be not quite the advantage I expected it
to be. In fact, it nearly resulted in the premature demise of my career as
Santa’s literary consultant. As Santa explained to me, some kids are already a
little alarmed by the concept of his omniscience, and my suggested responses to
their letters were compounding the creepiness factor exponentially. “Great job
in last week’s school concert, second only to your performance in the
Rainforest Play last May!” I wrote enthusiastically to one first grader who had
included none of this information in her letter to Santa. “I bet you’ll have a
wonderful Christmas, playing with your two little brothers and your new puppy,”
I wrote to another child who had stated in his letter merely that he wanted an
Xbox. “Have a happy holiday season AND a happy birthday on January 2nd,”
I cheerfully penned to a little girl whose birthday I happened to know.
And then I realized this wasn’t necessarily going so well.
Santa told me I was going to scare kids by knowing so much about them. He in
fact accused me of turning him into more of a Santa Stalker character than a
jolly old elf.
As Santa and I continued through our pile of letters from
kids with familiar names and addresses, I began to see why a little knowledge
may in this case be a dangerous thing. “The reindeer love landing at your house
because of that big open field right next door to you,” we wrote to one child.
But farther down the pile we came to a letter from that same child’s younger
brother, who wrote in block letters at the bottom of the page, “DON’T FORGET
WE’LL BE AT OUR SKI HOUSE IN NEW HAMPSHIRE ON CHRISTMAS.” Oh no, I muttered as
I scrabbled back through the pile to find the one I’d written to his sister,
who I feared would now spend the remaining two weeks before Christmas certain
that Santa would leave all her presents at the wrong house.
And there were also times when Santa had to rein in my
tendency to lecture the kids a little. “Was it really sensible to wear shorts
to school when it was thirty degrees out last week?” I wrote to one boy. Santa
sternly explained to me that that simply isn’t the kind of thing he says to
kids. He’s not anyone’s mother, he reminded me. He’s Santa.
It’s a little surprising Santa hired me for another season
at all. But I’m grateful he’s giving me a second chance. Now that I know what
I’m doing, I’ll exercise better self-restraint. Because it’s true: Santa does
know when you’ve been sleeping; and he knows when you’re awake. But if he
happens to also know that you left a crumpled sandwich wrapper on the table
last time you ate at Ferns and ignored the recess aide when she said to put the
balls back in the bin, it’s probably more in the holiday spirit if he keeps it
to himself.
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