by Osama Hosokawa

In my childhood days, I always pick Christmas as my favorite time of the year. Every year, I would always anticipate Santa coming down the fireplace to deliver my entire Christmas gifts. Starting September 1, my mom would remind the four of us that Santa is on the lookout for our behaviours. It's hard to behave well, however, the image of christmas sweets motivates me to finish my chores.

Another thing I find difficult is to share my Christmas sweets with my little brother. My mom would always divide the pack equally to us. However, tightwad as I am now, I always save some while my brother would gobble up his share in seconds. And when he'll start crying over my share, I am required to give some to him. Even if it was hard, christmas surely taught me two things - not to be greedy and be more mature.

Every year, mom would encourage us to write down our wishes. My wish list once contained a set of colorful pens, a Barbie doll and a box of christmas sweets blackjacks. Every wish always comes with a good deed in a form of chores. And when we misbehave, I always thought that has this private line to Santa for easier reporting. For my part, the worst punishment I could think of was when Santa gave half of my blackjacks to my little brother for my mischievous behavior.

Of course I have tried to get a glimpse of Santa many times. However, I always fall asleep and never caught him to appear on his sleigh. I've been doing it since I was 8 and he always beats me. But, my disappointment is cured when I find my Christmas stocking full of sherbets, candy canes, lemon bonbons and whatnot christmas sweets and a crisp one dollar bill. Maybe on North Pole Santa elves also manufacture dollars in their factory.

I gave up my attempts to get a glimpse of the real Santa sneaking on the fireplace. Little did I know that my little brother have the same plans as mine. He successfully caught who Santa really was when I was 12. For the first time, my tricky brother slowly consumed his blackjacks to keep his eyes awake until midnight. And guess who decided to split my christmas sweets into two? You guessed it right; my one and only mom. I must admit I wish I never knew who the real Santa was. Even if we still had the list, the knowledge slightly diminished our magical Christmas. - 39969

About the Author:

I'm a mom now whose 3-year-old clearly wants a hamper of christmas sweets for Christmas. I hope he won't catch me until he's old enough for him to have many Santa Stories like mine.