Dear Santa: I believe

There is a vicious rumor going around, one that needs to be cleared up once and for all. While covering a story at the Palmer Public Library last week, where Santa Claus showed up and offered handmade wooden toys to children, one bold 8-year-old in the bunch proclaimed to a group of his peers that "Santa Claus isn't real. How can he get to all those houses in one night?"

The other kids thought it through, not wanting to believe their buddy. Here's a piece of advice for them - don't believe him. Santa Claus is real. Very real.

I know he is real, because when I was a little 7-year-old living in Pennsylvania, I saw him. The real thing, too, not some mall Santa making a few bucks, either. That Christmas, I was at my grandma and grandpa's house - Mama and Papa, as we call them - when one of the adults noticed something out the window. They called for me, and when I got to the window, what to my wondering eyes appeared? That's right, a sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer.

I saw them flying through the sky with my own eyes. Of course, I was only 7 and I was the only person actually to see Santa Claus on his sleigh flying home to the North Pole, but it was real. Very real. And never again will I doubt Santa's existence.

Santa exists if we want him to, and I want him to. It's part of the power of Christmas. I want him to exist if for no other reason than to see the excitement well in children's eyes when they see him each December.

That alone is reason enough to believe.

That same morning at the Palmer library, several children were nervous and a little scared to sit on Santa's lap and tell him what they wanted for Christmas.

Santa reassured them, and eventually, they sat on his lap. The other children jumped with joy and excitement, just because Santa had come to the library to talk to them. It was a perfect example of the power Santa Claus wields in large crowds.

There are so many reasons not to believe in Santa Claus, but you can ignore them if you want. I've done that for 26 years now, and I plan on doing it for at least 26 more. There is no reward for not believing in him, so I figure it's just as easy to continue.

At one time in my life, I was convinced there was no Santa Claus. It was about the same time somebody told me there was this funny thing called e-mail in which I could type a letter and have it across the world in mere seconds.

"No way," I said. "That's not possible. Next, you'll tell me there's really a Santa Claus, too."

Much to my astonishment, e-mail really worked (thanks to Al Gore, who invented the entire Internet, right?) And if that was possible, getting things across the world in a second, why wasn't it possible that Santa could do much of the same thing with his sleigh and reindeer?

If they can deliver mail in microseconds, surely Santa can deliver presents in a few hours.

So there is no reason left for me not to believe. I saw him firsthand, I see how much excitement he generates in children and it is now possible to get across the world in a second or two.

There is just no way Santa Claus isn't real. There is too much evidence to the contrary.

So for the children at the library who started thinking about all this after their friend told them there wasn't really a Santa Claus, you can now see the rumor simply is not true.

There are too many indications Santa Claus as alive as he ever will be.

Sunday night, when Santa's sleigh is warming up at the North Pole, please make sure to leave him some milk and cookies on your table, as well as some carrots for the reindeer.

I want to make sure they have enough energy to get to my house, too.

Casey Ressler (ressler@alaska.net) is the Frontiersman Valley Life editor. His favorite season, other than baseball and fishing seasons, is Christmas.