Still wearing my crimson winter jacket and white stole, I donned my Moroccan hat with its small circular mirrors and entered Whole Foods. I paid for my coffee and éclair with a gingerbread man, a clever paper cutout with a bar code on the back, which my son had given me for Christmas.
The clerk was the man I have been gifting baklava and his attitude has become very warm and friendly. He picked up the gingerbread man and said, “So, this is on him? Ok.” and he swiped the man’s back with a laser. I told him about The Big Short, how it’s a must see for the intellectual inside of us, and sat down to eat my treat. (Santa always has dessert first.) After a conversation with a friend in northern California on my magic cell phone, I returned for the main course, also paid for by the gingerbread man.
Children are so fun this time of year. They just stare at me in awe. I know it is mostly their inner world being projected onto me, the living body screen, of the unconscious archetypal world. Part of it is picking up the loving vibe I have and part of it is seeing the reality of an old man with white hair and beard dressed in what they believe Santa Claus would be wearing. A girl and her brother, nine and eleven years old, were staring while their mother was looking at clothing. Suddenly she looked up and saw me. I smiled back at her and went to the Deli, where I found a selection of warm winter dishes waiting to be enjoyed. I selected mine and went to the cashier. That’s when I got “outed” by a little boy.
He might have been three years old, wearing a baseball cap and held in his father’s arms, on his dad’s hip, the way I used to carry my boys. The father was distracted with his cell phone and the mother was looking the other way, when I heard a very sweet, small voice say, “Hi Santa.” I smiled back and said, “Hi.” This seemed to shock the parents back into attending to their son, almost as though he had never spoken before or this was strange for him because he was extraordinarily shy. They continued to focus on me as their son was doing. He never broke eye contact with me, nor did he speak again. When I sat down to eat, I could feel the boy’s gaze and turned to notice the parents were continuing to say, “look there’s Santa”, hoping to elicit another word from their son. I remembered the high tech pocket knife which my son had given me was in my pocket. I got up and walked to the father, who was still holding his son. I opened his hand and put the small knife there, saying “This is for Daddy.” Then I closed the father’s hand before the son could see what I had given. I didn’t want the little boy to have a knife, but maybe someday his dad will give it to him.
The father’s “Thank you” was in a heavy foreign accent and I thought of where I had seen this body form before. Tall and slender with broad shoulders, the man had a black running suit with baggy pants. He reminded me of my nephew Joseph, whose family emigrated from Mexico. His fair complexion and black hair came from a grandfather who was Portuguese and a grandmother who was Moroccan. Joey looks more like me than most people in the Native American Church, who typically have brown skin. I could see the young father standing before me could easily have been my nephew, except the idea came to my mind that these people might be Syrian. We do have a Coptic Orthodox community here. I went to the Palm Sunday service at Saint Mary of Egypt’s church. Now there’s an ancient Christian tradition to experience in Coptic Greek, Arabic, and English in alternating songs and responses! The mother’s English was very clearly southern Californian. She was more fair, a beautiful family to be sure.
As I was finishing my meal, the family checked out and came over to my table. The father and the little boy, still in his Daddy’s protective arms, extended their arms and offered me a cupcake. The father modeled the behavior and put the gift next to my hand and said, “Here, Santa, this is for you.” The boy said nothing but extended his hand like his daddy. I took both cupcakes and said “Thank you” with a big smile. The little boy would not stop staring at me. He looked like he was experiencing some inner miracle. I have been told by others that I have guardian angels surrounding me and this kid looked like he could see them. After the family left the store, I walked up to the children and their mom whom I had seen earlier. They were having their dinner a few tables away from me. I asked the mother if she let her children eat “things like this” referring to the cupcakes. “Yes, I do,” she said. I explained how I had been “outed” as Santa Claus by the little boy and had been gifted the cupcakes by his family. I gave them to the little girl and her brother, whose beautiful kinky long hair and Afro-American skin shined with happiness. The mother was shocked and pleased. “That’s so sweet,” she said in a beautiful smile. The children were grinning from ear to ear.
It feels so good to give and to receive love any time of the year. Kindness to strangers makes us all feel welcome in this Windigo world.
Merlin and the White Eagle 