Santa. The idea is too good to be true and at the earliest ages, some children just know. There is a creeper dude wearing red and "stranger danger" just exudes on instinct for some. My sister's children both knew this ~ they couldn't be fooled for an instant. They wanted no part of this charade.
Then some of us (me included) take a lot longer to realize Santa is not the magic man who they say he is. He's just a man. For me, the wonder really happened with the math in my head to imagine how in the blue blazes that he could cover all of the earth's homes in one night ~ it was like imagining how many stars are in the sky and no adult could look me in the eye with a good rational answer.
Last week I encountered "off duty Santa" at a potluck in Sausalito. This one's name is Rick and his sister is Nicole Jackson who employed him for these photos below. Nicole is a talented newborn photographer based in Sonoma. These pictures are the outtakes undoubtedly not seen on the site. Look closely at the photo with the two girls and the child in white tights is drooling. Bless hearts, the magic is going off the rails. Hearing Rick talk about the photo shoot was special as well complete with the "behind the scenes" dying of his beard and hair for the part.
About six years ago the SF Gate used to publish the "Santa Tantrum Awards" but after googling just now, I see perhaps it's fallen out of fashion perhaps because of the current American political climate.
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