Magic of Christmas as fleeting as youth

I hopped out of our car to nab a spot in the long line to take photos with Santa Claus while my husband looked for parking in the jammed lot. We’ve been going to the same place for several years, at a local gardening center, and that morning, I took in the familiar scene: the fragrant evergreen wreaths arrayed for sale, the workers passing out steaming cups of hot apple cider and crisp butter cookies, and the children dressed in their holiday best, button-down shirts and matching velvet dresses and bows. Our boys had new red sweaters for the occasion, and we’d brushed their wayward hair — which Didi kept messing up, smirking while running both his hands through it until it stood on end.

Parents cradled their babies, who were probably meeting St. Nick for the first time — with the inevitable crying that follows — and toddlers horsed around, stages that we’d passed with the twins in our years adhering to this tradition. Then I noticed that my twin sons, who are 7 years old, seemed to be on the upper range of children in line. Anyone older than them stood in the company of younger siblings.

Wondering just when children stopped believing in Santa, I discovered online — to my great shock — that studies suggest that the average age is 8. And so, this Christmas is likely the last one in which my sons will watch the sleigh’s progress on NORAD, the last Christmas in which they’ll leave out milk and cookies for Santa and carrots for the reindeer. The last Christmas they’ll believe in magic?

When I moped about it, my husband reminded me that I’d wavered on Santa at first. I didn’t like the idea of lying to our children, but I’d gone along with it and soon their seasonal joy and excitement became mine, too. Now that the fantasy is likely ending, my feelings are bittersweet, yet another sign of the fleeting nature of childhood, of time itself.

In a study by researchers at Occidental College, children aged 3 to 9 were asked to compose questions for Santa that addressed how he accomplished his purported feats. Some respondents were also asked about Santa’s ability to travel around the world in a single night, to know whether every child has been naughty or nice, to make all Christmas toys in a single factory, to fly in a reindeer-drawn sleigh, and to enter houses through their chimneys — and if it were true, how so.

Some of the convoluted yet creative answers included: “he makes multiple trips”; “he has cameras all around the world”; “he has millions of elves who help him make the toys”; and “he takes off his jacket,” according to the study published in the journal Cognitive Development.

“Children come to doubt Santa’s existence because they become increasingly attentive to the physical constraints that make Santa’s existence impossible,” researchers said, especially at the age when they are also gaining a more sophisticated understanding of physical possibility.

“Young children may not possess the conceptual resources needed to question the extraordinary claims of a trusted authority ... let alone the intellectual motivation to do so.”

The cracks in my sons’ belief will only widen, and at this time next year, I don’t know if they will still believe, or if we will tacitly agree to keep up a mutual pretense.

“Is Santa real?” Gege asked in the car.

I evaded the question. “Are the kids talking about it at school?” They ignored me. “We put out milk and cookies, and in the morning, they’re gone and the presents are there,” Gege said. “Santa must be real.”

“Elves are about my size,” Didi explained, and spun out a mythology of his making: They’re the children of Santa and his wife, the elves retire and new ones take their place, they wrap presents and aren’t responsible for assembling every type of gift.

“If they made electronics, they would get electrocuted. Santa goes into stores after they’re closed,” he said. “And steals them?” I asked. No, Didi said, but then fell silent, contemplating Kriss Kringle’s ethics.

Eight is a “year of many questions,” a friend explained. His eldest wasn’t angry when she learned the truth about Santa, and she enjoys pretending for the sake of her younger brother, who is about the same age as the twins. She’s old enough to understand the concept of the spirit of giving, generosity and kindness — a yearly reminder that we can appreciate, whether or not we ever believed.

This Christmas is likely the last one in which my sons will leave out milk and cookies for Santa and carrots for the reindeer.