A Day in the Life of Santa Claus

I know the title says that this is an article about a day in the life of Santa, but, uh, Santa’s dead (hopefully). It totally wasn’t my fault, but to set the story straight, this will be about the last day in the life of Santa Claus.

Getting an interview with Santa was surprisingly easy. All I had to do was go to my local Walmart and ask the guy in the Santa costume if I could interview him for my Spec article. Two minutes later, I got an email from the North Pole inviting me to come over and speak with the real Santa Claus. They also requested that I report the Walmart employee for identity fraud. After getting that guy arrested, I started walking north.

So apparently, I couldn’t get to the North Pole just by walking north. I had to fly to Canada, ski through the Arctic, sneak past the reindeer surveillance system, swim across the hot chocolate moat, try to ration the hundred cookies and warm glasses of milk I immediately finished for breakfast, climb a 40-story Christmas tree, battle the elf squadron at the top using a candy cane I picked up along the way, and skin an already decaying reindeer carcass to make a warm fur coat with a shiny red button, all while flawlessly singing Christmas carols (the partridge is in an apple tree, right?). The journey almost cost me an arm and a leg, but I was determined to get my interview with Santa for Spec Humor and my glorious editors Munem and Mike (if I don’t make it back, it’s their fault). After 12 long days of Christmas, I finally arrived at Santa’s door ready to meet Mr. Claus himself.

Turns out, I was not ready to meet Mr. Claus himself. The first thing I noticed was that Santa was buff. Like seriously buff, Saint Nick looked like he could deck my halls anytime. He stood seven feet tall (so around my height), and I could see his abs, biceps, triceps, abs, quads, abs, calves, chest, and also abs flexing under his XXXXXL red bathrobe. I’m starting to understand how he managed so many trips on Christmas Eve. 

The second thing I noticed was that he was more caffeinated than the entire Stuyvesant population combined. He alternated between screaming and snoring every five minutes, and Lord have mercy on this man’s dentist. All of Santa’s teeth were dark from the amount of cookies he ate every day (disclaimer: the black things were not chocolate chips), and each time he opened his mouth, I got hit with peppermint caramel pumpkin spice cinnamon gingerbread chestnut coffee breath (if I develop a secondhand caffeine addiction, it’s Munem and Mike’s fault again). I couldn’t blame him, though. He pulled the craziest all-nighter every year, in part because everyone waited until the last minute to turn in their Christmas wish list. I almost felt bad for the guy, but then I remembered the trillion dollars and Lamborghini I asked him for, and… nah, he didn’t deserve my sympathy.

We set up the interview in his workshop. No one was there, as Christmas had already passed, and all of the elves were getting their well-deserved rest. Or at least I thought it was well-deserved.

“Those elves don’t deserve anything,” Santa began. “Every morning at 12:00 a.m., I have to wake up to their union picketing outside my home. They literally will not let me sleep until they get higher wages, shorter hours, safer working conditions, and more vacation days. Like, they’re already on vacation 11 out of 12 months of the year. What more do they want?”

“Health insurance and contributions to their 401k?” I suggested.

He glared at me. “Not helping. And 25 hours per day is reasonable; I’m giving them time to finish their work, and most of them just slack off making generations of gingerbread people and snowmen anyway. If they saw what I do on Christmas Eve, they’d be begging to stay in the factories. I have to use Christmas Magic to break into every home around the world within 24 hours. Do you know how many times I’ve gotten shot trying to sneak into the White House?”

“So you’re saying it’s possible to sneak into the White House,” I said. “Not that I would ever try to do so, but considering how I managed to get past your security in one piece, could you please describe your methods step-by-step so I don’t accidentally end up in the Oval Office tomorrow?”

He shrugged. “No can do. You need an invite from the President, and even then you’ll have to get past the surveillance system, secret moat, and guards and whatnot.”

“Sounds familiar,” I shot back.

He shrugged again. “Hey, I’m sorry if you got shot once or twice on your way here, but if I relax security for even a moment, the elves are going to escape. Not that I know why. They have a comfortable job and are paid a livable wage of two crumbs per day, and somehow their main complaint is safety. Does my workshop seem dangerous to you?”

I looked down from the 50-foot-high catwalk my feet dangled over. A burning Christmas tree illuminated the splatters of rotting gingerbread on the walls. A crowbar labeled “Christmas Magic” had impaled Frosty the Snowman next to porridge in a bright orange tree around a discarded flamethrower. A green elf hat stuck out of a roasting oven.

“Nope,” I answered without hesitation. “Perfectly safe.”

“You get it. You’re a pretty chill guy, y’know that? Nothing like Mrs. Claus. The woman has been playing ‘All I Want for Christmas Is You’ for the past thirty years. I can’t believe I gave her my heart that last Christmas. Sometimes I’ll sleep in the chimney just to get away from her, but whenever I do, she lights the fireplace. Firewood won’t be the only wood that’s burning. Do you have any idea how much it hurts when your jingle bells are in flames? And she makes fun of my Christmas tree for being smaller than a Jolly Rancher.”

I guess I could sympathize with him. “It’s okay, Santa. Size doesn’t matter.”

“Easy for you to say. The only reason why we’re still together is because she likes my eggnog. Anyways, if I go outside to put out the fire, I’m met with pitchforks and torches. While I’m dashing through the snow chased by elves on homemade skis, Mrs. Claus is laughing at us crashing into trees. The snow would be turning red and I’d hope my workers aren’t dead when I finally crawl back home with stitches in my head. There I’d find green fur on my bed, on the couch, and especially under the mistletoe. Mrs. Claus would play dumb, and to this day say she can’t figure out where all that hair came from.”

Green fur, the Grinch, Mrs. Claus, mistletoe… sounded like someone was trying to steal more than just Christmas this year. But I let Santa handle that situation on his own.

“Once I finish cooling off and cleaning up, it’s almost 4:00 p.m., and I start coming to town for work. On my way, I update the naughty list. I never want to put anyone on the list, but whenever I see someone who doesn’t wake up before his 11th period gym class starts, I just can’t call him a nice boy.” He looked directly at me when he said this.

“Ok, so I might’ve been late one or two… hundred times,” I started to explain. “But like, it’s just gym—”

“Hush, naughty boy,” he cut me off. “It’s the same with the elves. Any time I walk into my workshop, I don’t see anyone here. All of them arrive late, if at all, and they make a huge mess that makes it so difficult to walk around. It’s gotten to the point where every step I take is followed by a crunch and tiny screams.”

“How selfish,” I commented. “The elves, I mean.”

He nodded. “Even though I put every elf on the naughty list for reducing my legroom, they continue to inconsiderately block my way whenever I try to go anywhere. I can’t even give them coal because it’s too expensive and climate change is destroying my property value. Tall people sure have it hard in this world.”

I nodded in agreement.

“After work, though, I can finally relax and visit my reindeer. Sometimes I even eat dinner with them—milk and cookies taste so much better when I share them with Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, and that other reindeer I don’t recall. What was his name again?” he asked. He began stroking his beard, deep in thought, stroking and stroking and… yeah he wasn’t going to get it.

“Rudolph?” I offered.

“Right, right, Rudolph. The one with the big ego. Every time we take the sleigh for a test run, he insists on guiding it just because he has a shiny nose. I let him lead the other reindeer for one foggy night, and now he thinks he can do anything. He’s going off on his own, flying solo, and doesn’t even call home anymore. It’s been, what, 12 days since I last saw him? Even if he can be annoying sometimes though, I hope he’s okay.”

I looked down at my warm fur coat. Santa also looked directly at my warm fur coat. His eyes widened. Oh… 

I got up quickly. “So it was really nice meeting you—”

“RUDOLPH!! IT WAS YOU!” he screamed, pointing at me.

As if on cue, the shiny red button started glowing.

“Can we just have a holly jolly conversation?” I pleaded. “This is not what it looks like, and I will definitely explain this once I finish writing my Humor article. Then, we can find a replacement for Rudolph and you can give me that Lamborghini I asked for and your wife will stop cheating on you with the Grinch and—”

“SHE WHAT?!”

Oops.

Santa stood up and I got a good view of just how huge this guy was. How did he even fit in a chimney?

“You’ve been a naughty boy. You’re gonna be working in the factories for the rest of your life,” he cackled while pulling out a green elf hat from… I didn’t want to know where.

“Wait, I’m still a minor! Doesn’t this violate child labor laws?”

Santa laughed at me. “Child labor laws? How old do you think the elves are?”

He started lumbering towards me, and I did what any rational person would do when a giant seven-foot man charged at them: I prepared to shatter his ornaments down there and escape while he ho-ho-howled in pain. However, I didn’t, because his caffeine crash finally hit and he started snoring again. I caught a whiff of his peppermint caramel pumpkin spice cinnamon gingerbread chestnut coffee breath and fell off the catwalk along with Santa, who sleepwalked off the edge before me. My life and his chiseled abs flashed before my eyes, and I said my goodbyes: Goodbye, family, I’ll miss you. Goodbye, Stuy, I might miss you. Goodbye, Spec Humor, I always knew I’d die for you (but I still loved you). Between Munem and Mike, my favorite was—oh wait, I’m not dead. 

By some Christmas miracle, I survived. Santa’s chiseled abs had broken my fall—or maybe my fall had broken his chiseled abs (and every other bone in his body). Either way, Santa saved me. What a great guy.

So you see, it wasn’t my fault that Santa died. At least, I think he’s dead. Right before Santa’s workshop accidentally exploded, which was definitely also not my fault, I faintly heard someone yell, “I KNOW WHERE YOU LIVE.” Hopefully, that doesn’t mean anything.