Ho Ho Ho

Confession: I wish I still believed in Santa.

The facts don't lie. Every year I have to do Santa's job for him. I buy the gifts. I wrap them up. I put them under the tree. And he takes all the credit. If there really is a Santa, he owes me $6,234.67, and I want it.

I am pretty sure there is no Easter Bunny either. Who goes out and buys bags of yummy little chocolate eggs? Me. Who gets up at the crack of dawn and packs jelly beans and little bunny candies into plastic eggs for the egg hunt? Yep, me. And who puts up with the wads of Easter grass that continue to surface around the house until Thanksgiving? Me, that's who. So, Easter Bunny, if you too are out there, you better run, because I'm coming for you and I've got Elmer Fudd with me. Oh, and run the vacuum next time you swing by.

I am just down right positive there's no tooth fairy. Who's kidding who here? If this chick is for real I definitely want a refund of all the singles I have slipped under the pillow. What does she think I am a stripper?

But kids, ahhh kids, they believe. Do they believe because we tell them to? Or is it inherently within them to believe? How nice it must be to be pure enough in mind to believe that anything is possible. Can you even remember when you could believe the existence of a big old fatty cramming gifts into a flaming chimney in the middle of the night? Can you recapture a time when you actually believed that a winged tooth swiper would fly into your room and trade parts extracted from the human mouth for cold hard cash? Ahh the beauty and innocence of youth.

So my question is this: At what point do we pull the rug out from under our kids? When exactly are we supposed to burst their bubble of innocence? You know, when do we tell them that Santa or the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy are not real? Now I know a few of you may be scratching your heads, squirming in your chairs, saying "what do you mean the Easter Bunny is not real?", but I am here to tell you if you don't already know, that these things are all just a part of the magic of childhood. And someday, probably through no fault of our own, but rather from some whiny, snot nosed, little spoil sport at school, your kids too will find out that you've been conning them since birth.

So is it best to tell them before that a-hole little Jimmy does? My question remains, when are we "too old" to believe in things like this? At what age is our youthful innocence mistaken for being a "baby"? I ask this only because tonight my oldest, #1, lost another tooth. She is almost 7. I dutifully shoved the money under her pillow after she was sleeping. When I went back to my room I thought "how much longer will this go on?" She seems so excited and elated to think that the tooth fairy would be flying in later that night. I wish that that innocence never had to fade. I wish that I could hold her in that moment forever. I wish that I could count on her not to rat me out to her younger siblings when she finds out the truth. So, how about you? Do you believe?