The week before Christmas, the campground filled with new people, including some children. I was excited to have playmates, even though I understood that they were on vacation and would not stay. I made a new friend one day and we climbed one of the crazy oak trees. While we were sitting in the tree, I asked her, “How do you think Santa Claus can find us when we are away from home? And how do you think he can get in the camper when there’s no chimney?” It was the first Christmas that I did not live in a house with a fireplace or a wood stove.
“Don’t you know there’s no such thing as Santa Claus?” she replied, surprised at my ignorance.
“That’s not true!” I yelled, aghast. “Then where do the presents come from?”
“Your parents,” she said. “How do you think you get what you want?”
I was still in shock. “I always write a letter to Santa Claus before Christmas! On Christmas Eve I leave milk and cookies out for him, and they are gone in the morning,” I explained, sure that this would prove Santa’s existence.
“It’s your parents that eat the cookies. Just ask them,” she said.
I could not believe that every adult I knew had been lying to me my entire life.
“It’s not true!” I yelled, “There really is a Santa!” I climbed down from the tree and ran to the Space Age Dumpster where Cheryl was cooking. To my dismay, she corroborated the story.
When I got gifts for my birthday
and Christmas the next day, I knew that Santa Claus couldn’t have
made them – my second favorite gift after a Darci doll was a box for my
dolls that Papa made from a drawer that was in the original Dumpster.
He had taken The Dumpster apart and made it into a trailer that he
could carry things in to sell at the flea market, and the drawer had
become scrap material. He had built dividers inside it, made a cover from wood paneling, and attached a suitcase handle to the top. My mother had painted flowers on the box to make
it look like a fancy doll carrier.
Perhaps THEY were Santa's real elves, working together in secret while I played in the trees. Even then I sensed that elves in the North Pole couldn't have made mass-produced toys that had "Made in China" stamped on the back.
Here's the doll carrier. It still holds my dolls, although the sliding top is broken into two pieces after 30 years of use. Compare it to the photo of the 1976 official Barbie carrier that I found on eBay. Which one was made in Santa's workshop?