This was also Carolena's first time to learn the hard way that Santa doesn't always bring what you want. Bummer. Turns out if you can't be persuaded to ask Santa for something other than a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle bike and a live wombat, you're going to be disappointed. You'll shoot your eye out kid.
Come Christmas morning Carolena dashed out to the fireplace only to find a pink and white bike with flowers on it and a TMNT zippered bag attached to it. I could tell by her face that she was devastated. All visions of making the neighborhood jealous as she whipped down the street on her new black and green bike flew from her head as she stared at a bike with flowers on it. Flowers.
Carolena was insanely mature about the bike. I think she knew deep down that the wombat was a long shot, but the bike she thought was in the bag. We'd looked at bikes in stores all over town. She would stare at "the Teenage Mutant Turtle one" and tell me that was the one she was going to ask Santa to bring. She could not be persuaded otherwise. Unfortunately for Carolena, they don't make those bikes small enough for her.
They also don't make Ninja Turtle bikes for girls (uhhh... helllo?!?!) and as my mom put it, "have you ever fallen onto that bar?!" So getting the too big boy bike was not an option for Santa. Not an option at all. Except for when it was an option and in the
She was a great sport about it though. She still acted happy and posed for pictures. There was no mention of disappointment or failure on the part of the right jolly old elf himself.
Later on in the day she quietly mentioned that while she had asked Santa specificially for a Ninja Turtles bike, he had instead brought her a pink and purple bike with flowers on it. Flowers, for pete's sake.
I think she had Ramona-esk visions of speeding through our streets on the TMNT bike, the envy of all other kids and these visions were destroyed by something in the form of pink and purple. Poor Carolena. It was a little heart-wrenching, but did make me think of my friend who told me recently that she wishes her parents had not raised her to believe that she could always have anything she wanted. This, she says, has led her to be thirty-something and just now having to learn the hard way that she does not and cannot in fact, "have it all."
So, yes, Carolena, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! How dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Carolenas. He might not bring you live animals from Australia or bikes that are intended for boys several inches taller than you, but thank God he lives and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Carolena, nay 10 times 10 thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
And, thankfully for mommies everywhere, making glad the heart of childhood has nothing to do with live wombats. Well, very little to do with them at least.
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