We had our first Santa sighting today....and Santa was undercover! Milo and I were on way out of school this afternoon, when we walked by the office. There was an older gentleman sitting at one of the desks in the office, and the man had white hair, a little bald on top, and a full white beard and mustache, plus he was a bit portly. He was dressed in regular old guy clothes: tan sansabelt slacks and a yellow polo shirt. Milo's eyes got really huge and he whispered "Mommy...that's SANTA!" I said, "Let's go find out!"
Miss Ethel (the guard at the door) buzzed us back into the school, and we went into the office. Milo got really shy, and the old guy asked us what we needed. Milo finally took a step towards him and said "Are you....are you SANTA???" The old guy said "Why, yes, son, I am. And who are you?" Milo said "I'm Milo. M-I-L-O. Write it down." Santa dutifully pulled out a piece of paper and a pencil and wrote down the kid's name. Then Santa asked Milo what he wanted for Christmas, and Milo told him "A red robot with wheels that looks like Fred. But he's red." Santa wrote all this down too, while looking at me like "What the hell is he talking about?" I said "It's a good thing Santa has a helper to keep track of all those notes, huh?" Santa got the gist and said "Yes, I will make sure I keep your name and request at the top of my list." Then I asked Milo why he thought Santa was hanging out at the school in regular clothes. Milo's answer: "To check on all the children!" Santa said "That's right, I have to check my list twice to see who's been naughty or nice!" With that, Milo said "Merry Christmas, Santa!" and we left. Milo talked all the way home about how we saw Santa in his time off, and that he doesn't have to mail his Christmas list now because he was able to tell Santa himself before the other kids got to.
How cool is that though, that the old guy totally played along with Milo's pure belief in Santa, and didn't once let on that he wasn't the big guy. How are we to know he wasn't, actually?
