Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, and …
Growing up both Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny were real. Their yearly delivery of presents and candy was proof enough for me — I was a born believer. Of course, it didn’t hurt that my parents (those amazing people that clothed and fed me at no charge) were believers as well (or so they said). But the time my uncle convinced me that I had just seen the Easter Bunny — that sealed the deal — I was a believer for life!
I was six when I saw the Easter bunny. My uncle and me were in the kitchen, looking out the window. We were on bunny watch, hoping to catch a glimpse of the bunny delivery candy and hiding eggs. I do not recall just how long we stood there, me on tiptoe, peering out the window, but I do remember the excitement in uncle Johnny’s voice when he interrupted the silence. “There, did you see that? The Easter Bunny just ran behind that car,” my uncle said pointing at a light blue car across the street.
“I missed it.”
“Keep watching the car, he’s there. He’ll have to go from the car to the trash cans, you’ll see him. He has a schedule to keep — ” Just then, I am not sure if I saw it or my belief in my uncle allowed me see it (or by some strange coincidence a dog or cat did it) but I swear I saw the trashcans move. Before I could say anything my uncle exclaimed, “There, did you see that? He ran behind the trashcans.”
“I saw it. I saw the Easter bunny. He’s right over there,” I said pointing out the window. And then I saw — or imagined — something dart from behind the cans into the shrubs. “There he goes again,” I said filled with joy. “He’s real and I saw him I saw the Easter bunny!”
My uncle didn’t say a word, he just smiled.
Years later, I had to face the fact that the Easter Bunny was no more real than “Martian Cookies” (a tale for another time). A few years after learning that Santa Claus was a fake, I admitted to my parents that I had lost my belief in him as well. I had carried on the charade of Santa Claus for years, at the urging of my older siblings. They feared that without me still believing in Santa Claus, there would be one less present for each of them under the tree. I don’t recall if our present allotment decreased after my admission or not. For some strange reason, learning that both the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus were fictional in nature, had little effect on me. I shrugged off their deaths and life continued on. But, there was a childhood belief that a neighbor took from me that saddens me to this day.
I was eight, maybe nine, and in the neighbor’s garage watching him work on one of his model planes. He was putting paper onto the wings, which was done with a strong smelling compound called dope. It made the paper transparent and when it dried created an extremely smooth surface. The only thing I liked more than watching and occasionally helping work on his planes, was watching them fly. I’m pretty sure he never let me fly any of his planes, but I do recall being allowed to start them up. (Imagine the outcry today if a teenager and a nine-year-old were in the park — alone — with gas and engines with propellers that could chop off your finder.) Years later I would build and fly planes of my own.
As the day wore on and the sun moved across the sky, it came to a place where it was shining in through the open door. A door, I had been told, that must be left open for ventilation—venta what? As the sunlight streamed through the door, thousands of sunbeams came to life and danced around. There were more sunbeams than I had ever seen before. Little did I know that those were the last sunbeams I would ever see.
After telling the neighbor to look at the sunbeams and watching him shake his head as one does when you hear someone say something that you know is wrong, he walked to where the sunbeams were dancing, and killed them. He took a rag from the workbench (one I had used earlier to wipe sawdust off some balsa wood parts) and he flicked it in the doorway. To my surprise, more sunbeams appeared. To my horror, he showed me that sunbeams were nothing more than dust (or in this case sawdust) floating in the air, reflecting sunlight.
A flick of a rag had turned magical sunbeams — little sunshine bugs — into everyday specks of dust. I’m not sure if I ever went back after that to help him with his planes but that day, standing in the doorway, my last magical childhood belief was laid to rest.
