The Parade in Radiator Springs, NC (Lilesville, NC)

For a guy that supposedly lives at the North Pole, I HATE cold weather. I frequently tell clients that I am a South Pole Santa. So it seems perfectly fitting that 2 of the 3 parades I did this year were in sub freezing weather.

The 3 parades I am involved in are Thomasville, Greensboro and Lilesville. Lilesville?? Where the heck is Lilesville? I'll get to that.

The first parade in the Piedmont is always Thomasville. The Thomasville Parade is sponsored by the Fairgrove Lions Club and is the Saturday before Thanksgiving. It stretches for about 3 miles, has 150 or so entries. This year's parade saw warm weather and a huge crowd.

Next, for me, is the Greensboro Holiday Parade held the first Saturday in December. This year for the first time ever, it snowed for the parade. The News and Record holds a coloring contest each year and the winning kids get to ride on Santa's float. We were upstairs at the Jaycee office when it started to snow. The kids riding with me were excited, the adults walking with the float less so. The Jaycees tell me that this year's parade drew a record crowd. I'm sure they were right but when it started to snow the record crowd started to leave. By the time my float came by most of the crowd was gone. The kids and I had a great time anyway.

Now on to Lilesville. Lilesville is about 8 miles west of Rockingham off Hwy 74 and theirs is the only parade I'm in that is a Night Parade.The small town of several hundred usually draws about 4000 for the parade. That's usually! This year the temp was at 26 with a windchill of 12 when we started. I was very bundled up so all that was cold was my face. I can tell you at a 12 degree windchill, no rouge is needed to obtain rosy cheeks.

All was going as usual except there were no people. None. I really didn't get what was going on until about half way through. It was then that I realized that everyone was sitting in their cars watching the procession. Every now and then a little arm or head would pop out of a window only to be quickly withdrawn.

It was like I had been transported into the movie Cars and this was the Radiator Springs Christmas Parade. While I did not see Lightening McQueen, I did see a fairly good representation of Tow Mater. If I'm lyin' I'm diein'.

Merry Christmas!

In the coldest part of the year, the days are short, the nights seem never ending. The trees are bare. Their life essence withdrawn to the safety of their core. People are gathered near to the fire. A part of them is convinced that the Sun will never return.

Just when despair is at its highest a lone figure appears. He is not depressed nor depressing. His demeanor could be said to be downright Jolly. He is a large man reminding us that life is large. He is dressed in winter clothes but not in dark subdued colors. He wears instead festive colors of red, white and sometimes green. Flung across his back is a sack. In it are treats for the wee ones and hope for everyone. He is a stranger that we have known all our lives. We welcome him into our homes knowing that he will bring out the best in us. He reminds us that the presents we receive are minor compared to the gifts we have to give.

Some say he is from another time. Some say he is of all time. Some say he died long ago and became a Saint. Others insist that he will never die as long as we hold him in our hearts. This is for certain; just when we need him the most, is precisely when he appears.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart to those of you that invited me into your homes and businesses. It has been my pleasure to have been a part of your Holiday Celebrations. While I sincerely hope my appearance helped make your Holidays brighter, I wanted you to know that I am a better person and a better Santa for having met you.

Merry Christmas and a Happy and Prosperous New Year to you and yours.
Santa Jac Grimes

Finding Santa

Tomorrow, (Dec 21) is the last day of school before Christmas break. It seems fitting that I should publish this article about the last day of school Christmas 2005.

If you ask a group of 1^st or 2^nd graders what they want to be when they grow up, you will get a myriad of answers. Kids want to be like people they admire. Police, Firefighters, Teachers and Movie or Sports stars are among the popular choices. One occupation you will likely never hear from this group is Santa Claus. Santa is too big, too magical and too wonderful to be considered as a career. Besides, most kids know there is only one true Santa and the big guy himself already has that job.


So how does one become Santa? What makes a perfectly sane man grow a long beard, don a red suit and invite children and sometimes adults, to sit on his lap and tell him their most intimate wishes? Let me let you in on a Santa secret that only guys in the red suit know. You don't find Santa; Santa finds you.


One day you look in the mirror and the red beard you've sported most of your adult life is no longer red. Much as you try to keep it neatly trimmed to make people mistake you for Sean Connery, your general body build always gives you away. As hefty as Kenny Rogers is he still has more hair than you and Burt Reynolds can afford a much better toupee than you can.


Kids start asking if you are "him" and soon adults do too. You start to prefer red jackets, shirts and ball caps and you're not even a NC State fan. Then one day you walk into a salon and Santa walks out. How did you get to this point?


Every Professional Santa I know has had a defining moment. Something theologians call an "aha" experience or an epiphany. The moment when doubt ceases and faith begins. When you no longer think you may make a good Santa but know with every cell of your being that you are Santa. Mine goes like this…


I had been driving a school bus for 3 years, having decided that I really liked working with kids more that I wanted to manage people. I had worked my way up to a countywide standby position and was the night dispatcher for the 24^th largest school bus fleet in the nation. In short I was a problem solver and the resident "go to" guy. It was the last day of school before the Christmas break and I had been assigned to an elementary school where I had never driven before. It's been my habit to wear an inexpensive Santa hat around the holidays and I decided to wear one to drive in that afternoon. I thought it might be fun to have "Santa" drive the kids though it was a clear violation of school policy. I was totally unprepared for what happened next.


As the younger kids boarded first most were totally stunned. There in the regular driver's place was a big guy with a real gray beard wearing a red jacket and a Santa hat, the day before Christmas break! Some of them asked in quiet voices full of awe, " Are you him? Are you really here?" I told them I was and their parents had asked me to check in on them to make sure they were really being good. As the upper grades boarded they were more skeptical but seeing the reaction of the younger students, decided it would be okay to play along. I don't know how long it's been since you've been on a school bus but I can tell you it is a noisy, rowdy place. This is especially true if you are a substitute driver like me. You could hear a pin drop most of the trip. It was the best bus ride I had ever had! No one, I mean not a single kid, misbehaved. The magic of Christmas had found my school bus on a cold afternoon in December. Santa had found me.

Reconciling Santa Claus and Unitarian Universalism

People often ask me how I can reconcile being Santa Claus and being a Unitarian Universalist since most UUs (including myself) do not consider themselves Christians. Here is a short writing Marian Stewart, a UU Minister friend of mine, sent me.

Thought you might like this reading from Celebrating Christmas: An Anthology. Edited by Carl Seaburg. page 160.


There he sat, red suit, conical hat, fur-trimmed and all, on that chilly park bench, glancing skyward as though assessing the chance of snow.

I sat beside him. "How come you're not out there on the corner with your iron pot and bell?"

"I am not one of them," he replied, "I happen to be Santa Claus."

I smiled, pleasantly enough, but my doubt must have showed.

"I really am," he said, a trifle wistfully.

"But how can you tell if you are the real Santa Claus?"

"That is the question," said he, "How tell the true prophet from the false?"

"But do you really live at the North Pole?"

"Legend," he replied, "The fact is that I am everywhere."

"Are you also omniscient and omnipotent?"

"You mistake me for a friend of mine."

A little embarrassed,I yet persisted. "Perhaps you only think you are Santa Claus."

"That would be my problem, not yours. But I might point out that there are no children around."

"That is odd," I conceded.

"The reason," he said "is that I cannot be seen."

Like a chess player crying out "Check-mate" I said, "I see you!"

"And that is your problem, not mine."

We both looked up at the sky. "It might snow," he said, "It's better when it snows. But snow or not I must be going."

"Going where?"

"To distribute toys, of course."

"One last question. What is the spirit of Christmas?"

"Well, if you want to sound scholarly you might call it the ultimate potential. It's the moment when the best that is human surmounts all the stumbling blocks on the path to becoming. You care, so you help. You love, so you give. And you dream... you dream of the time when this brief season will be extended to the whole year."

"Don't you sometimes get discouraged?"

"Dear me, I've only been at this for a few centuries. Give me time."

Christmas Can’t Wait

This is a story I wrote from an experience during my first year as a Professional Santa. I hope you enjoy it.

I remember as a child that the closer Christmas got, the more anxious I was that it arrived. I just couldn't wait. Our family tradition was to open one present on Christmas Eve and the rest had to wait until the next morning. As we got older we wanted to define tomorrow as anytime after midnight but my parents were adamant that tomorrow was after 6:00 am. When you think about it if my parents had allowed us to open everything under the tree, it was mostly socks and underwear because all the really cool stuff came from Santa anyway.

  

So waiting was hard. But what if you couldn't wait? What if asking a child to wait would mean the child wouldn't see Christmas at all?
 

Christmas Morning for a 5 year old in my area was on a Thursday in September. She was not expected to be with us at Christmas and so she could not wait.

I decided early in my Santa career that I would choose my charity work and not allow it to choose me. Santa is the living embodiment of giving and what could be more giving than working with hospice. I already had a relationship with Hospice through my son Robbie, more on him later, so early in my Santa decision I approached them and volunteered to be their Santa.

I stopped by the office to start working on my holiday schedule and reminded my case worker that I was Santa all year if there was a need. She called me that afternoon and said be careful what you wish for. She asked me to be there in the morning and explained the situation. I was very excited and very nervous.

So Christmas came early for a 5 year old little girl and her 2 year old brother. I was very nervous the night before but by the time I got dressed that morning I was focused. Since this was a last minute call, I hadn't gotten around to getting a Santa Bag so Liz made me one at the night before out of the same velvet my suit is made of.

I met Kate (the case worker) at the Kidspath office and she had arranged for several presents for her client and the little brother. A local toy store provided the presents and Santa's new bag was full. It was so full that we tore the wrapping paper on one of the presents as we loaded the bag. Some tape took care of that problem and we were off.

Kate drove us the short distance to the family's apartment and I went in after Kate with my bag over my shoulder Santa-style.  This little angel was no longer able to speak, walk or even smile but she KNEW who I was. When I walked in she held out her arms and after I sat down my bag, her mom handed her to me. You could feel the joy in the room. Families with chronically or terminally ill children have a tough life. Sometimes it takes everything they have just to get through the day. I know this is true because we lost our son Robbie in 2003 to HIV/AIDS.

   

After a big hug we sat down and visited for a while. Then we got right to the presents. There were several "princess" items including a princess set with a tiara and a magic wand. Santa's little princess wore her tiara and held her wand for the rest of the visit.
 

Little brother got a tool set and a RC car. After opening the tool set, he could care less what else Santa had or what was going on. He was into the "electric" drill. He was afraid of Santa (2 yrs) and wouldn't sit on my lap, but liked the presents and gave me a high 5 before I left.

This is an immigrant family and their sponsors were there. They acted as Grandma and Grandpa sort of, and they were great. Grandpa took about 40 pictures and Kate took several with my camera. I took my photo printer and we printed a photo, which I autographed and put in a photo folder. (We did the printing back at the office, and Kate took it over later that afternoon.)

After presents were opened I read "A visit from St. Nicholas" and used a roll over doll Liz found for me at a thrift store while we were in Atlanta for the International University of Santa Claus. I didn't think Grandma was going to let me have the doll back. (Ho, Ho, Ho) I could see that my princess was getting tired so we said our good byes and left on an upbeat. Back in the car Kate told me the timing was just right.

When we got back to Kidspath a worker asked if I would go through Hospice so the employees could see Santa. Hating all that extra attention, yeah right, I reluctantly agreed. Kate was a great "elf" handing out stickers and small jingle bells. I had large bells tied to my boots so some of the employees came out to see what all the noise was about. It was great. One nurse told me later that when she saw me it was like she was 4 years old again. That makes being Santa all the more worthwhile.
 

About two weeks later I got an email from Maura, my Hospice volunteer coordinator. It said to call her at the office. I had my hands in several Hospice and Kidspath pots so I wasn't sure what she wanted. When she told me our little friend had died, I wasn't really prepared. I knew when I accepted the assignment that would be the eventual outcome, but when it happened so soon after my visit, I hit the wall. While sitting on my back porch sobbing, Liz came out to join me. I told her I was sorry I couldn't hold it together. Her response was "When you get to a point when this doesn't hurt, it'll be time to stop."

Loving arms surrounded the little princess when the time to move on came and I was told she crossed the veil peacefully. I am honored to have been a part of her last few days and can only hope that the joy of Santa's visit will bring some comfort to her grieving family.

A few days later, Liz read me her obituary and informed me of her funeral plans and a prayer service the night before. I was scheduled to work during the hours of the funeral so I dressed in my best Non Santa attire and went to the prayer service. It was held in her native language, so of course I didn't understand a word, but I did get a chance to see her and say goodbye.

It is always difficult to attend the funeral of a child. Even when it's expected, the sight of a small body in a small coffin is tough. As Santa we see so many kids during a holiday season that we rarely know what an impression we actually make. I know my visit made a positive impression on this family. As I looked down on this child, taken from her family way too soon, I noticed that she was dressed in a beautiful rainbow colored sarong from her native country. On her beautiful head was Santa's tiara. It's times like this that make the twinkle in Santa's eye run down his rosy cheek.

Welcome to the Mind of a Professional Santa Claus

Welcome to Santa's Ramblings. If you got here from my Website or Facebook Fan Page, you already know that I am a Professional Santa. If you found your way here by other means, you may want to check out www.SantaJac.com or look up Santa!!! on Facebook.

What you may not know I hope you will learn as I develop this blog and get into the habit of writing my thoughts down. Some will be very Santa related, others not so much but they will truly be me.

Although I intend to refrain from vulgar language or subjects, this Blog is most certainly NOT for kids. I'm just not really sure they will find what I have to say interesting. You may not either but that's ok.

So come along for the ride. It should be interesting.

Santa Jac Grimes