I do believe...

Before I had children, I worked for a recreation department in one of the many cities in our county.  I worked at the pool teaching and life guarding, but we also had a staff recreation specialist whose job it was to come up with all these different activities, most of which we found crazy considering we were a swimming facility.  Nine months out of the year we were an outdoor facility, the other three our pool was covered with an inflatable bubble that was kept up by constant fans blowing in cold air.  It was a very moist facility during those three months.

When the bubble was up it was during the winter months and so we decorated the outside area with Christmas stuff for whatever idea the recreation specialist would come up with for the holidays.  One year she put together "Christmas under the bubble" which was a free night of swimming, but kids would also get to meet Santa.  We had to decorate a chair for Santa and bring in a Christmas tree that would all have to be taken down by the next day or it would end up a soggy mess.  A Santa suit was rented and reservations were taken.  Somewhere along the lines the person who was to play Santa couldn't make it and so our boss, Larry, was used as a substitute.

Larry had Santa's figure, but he had red hair and no facial hair.  That was easily solved with a red hat and fake beard, but when he sat down in the chair I began to panic because he looked like Larry.  On the list of reservations was one of our favorite little boys, Robert, who was in Larry's swim class, and I just knew that he was going to know Santa was really Larry once he climbed up on his lap.  He was going to know him from his eyes and his voice, I just knew it.  I kept agonizing over the whole thing as we prepared the bubble for the big night, and I finally decided that Larry needed to wear sunglasses.  He tried on his sunglasses, but they were too light.  We eventually had to settle for a pair I had in my locker, the only problem being that in the bottom corner of the glasses they said, "shit happens".  We decided he couldn't get too close to the parents just in case.  He spent all day practicing his "Santa voice."

The big night arrived and the few kids we had strolled in and waited in line to sit on Santa's lap.  When it was finally Robert's turn he crawled into Santa Larry's lap, his eye wide with excitement.  He stared into Santa's face and listened to Larry tell him what a good boy he had been all year.  It was then I realized that it didn't matter who played Santa because children really believe in the whole magic of him at Christmas time.  Robert didn't have a clue that the man before him was really his swimming teacher, not even after Larry took off the shit happens sunglasses.

Robert:  "Why are you wearing sunglasses, Santa?"

Santa Larry:  "Ho, Ho, Ho, Robert, that is a good question." (dirty look at me) "But Santa knows that Florida is very sunny."

Robert:  "But it's night time."

Santa Larry:  "So it is Robert, and these glasses are getting quite foggy here inside this bubble."

Robert spent quite some time talking to Santa without his glasses and never once did he not believe.  Kid after kid after kid climbed into Santa Larry's lap and gave him their Christmas list, not questioning why Santa was sitting inside a bubble covering a swimming pool.  Santa was there to talk to them and that is all they cared about.  It was a big moment in my life, realizing how big Santa Claus was to children.

Which leads me to this picture that I found in going through my slides.  I hadn't noticed it when I first put these on my computer, but in searching for a photo for my random photo of the day I noticed that this Santa, who appeared at my house in 1971, looks an awful lot like someone I know...