Why I support Operation Santa Claus

Why I support Operation Santa Claus

by Chapter 19 President Juli Carter

Growing up was hard but not unbearable. My parents were divorced. My mother was receiving welfare and my dad did what he could after losing the only job he had known since leaving the military when the business closed for good.

Yes, we had help from organizations like Operation Santa Claus and the Salvation Army when we were younger, but that is only a very small part of why I support Operation Santa Claus. This is why. This may sound like a sad movie but it actually happened. I know, I was there.

I was about 16 this particular Christmas season. I had a part time job and was going to school. It was a Friday night and we were sitting around the dinner table talking excitedly about Christmas being a week away. I was very excited because it was the first year I could actually buy presents for my siblings and parents. This would be my littlest sister's first real Christmas. She was a little over a year old and caught up in the excitement. During the conversation my dad mentioned some really bad news he had heard from his sister.

His sister had become a widow the year before. She had five children to raise on her own. Her youngest was three and her oldest was nine. She was living on Social Security Survivor Benefits and food stamps. She lived in the area of our town that was considered the slum area because it was all she could afford. She didn't qualify for help because of her Survivor benefits, and the other help she could have gotten she was too proud to ask for.

They had an artificial tree gotten when her husband was still alive and she and the children had decorated it with decorations the children had made and the few store bought decorations that had survived over the years. She had planned for Christmas presents by getting a layaway so the children did not go without. She had picked the presents up and gotten them all wrapped and around the tree before my cousins got home and while the youngest was napping. She received her benefit check once a month and she did get food stamps so she would be able to buy groceries for the month with a little extra for the holiday meal the coming weekend. My aunt went without a lot of things so my cousins didn't.

The school was having a Christmas program that my aunt attended. When they returned home she saw that her front door was open. She had my cousins go to the neighbor's house across the street and told the oldest to have the neighbor call the police. My aunt went in her home. The Christmas tree was destroyed. The presents were gone along with the old TV they had and the radio. The house was completely trashed. She went to her bedroom, which was a bed in the hall way and checked under her bed for her purse. It was gone. In it was all the money they would have until the first of the new year. The thieves had taken the food, the presents, everything of value and destroyed what wasn't valuable.

We sat there in silence for awhile. My dad said that since we didn't really need anything right away he wanted to know if we would mind if he returned the items he got us for Christmas so he could help his sister out. I was the oldest of us kids. I told dad that it was okay if he returned my stuff if he wouldn't mind if I returned his. Pretty soon it was all agreed by unanimous decision to return our gifts and help our aunt and cousins. Dad said she would never accept the money so we had to buy the stuff and sneak it into her home while she was at Candlelight Services. The women were in charge of the shopping and cooking. The men had one important job. Swipe my aunt's key, make a duplicate, and get it back to her before she missed it. It took 25 tries before we finally got the right key.

We loaded the presents, the food, the new ornaments into the car and tied the tree to the top of it. Eight kids, a dog, and two adults in a station wagon with all that stuff sitting quietly at the end of the street with the lights off waiting for my aunt to leave. When they did we drove down and parked in front of their home and quietly(?) got everything inside. We decorated the tree, and put the presents underneath, stocked the cabinets and left an envelope with a money order made out to my aunt with enough money to hold them for the rest of the month. We were giddy with excitement and when we finally got home we were up the rest of the Christmas Eve talking and laughing about the silly things that happened. We were the worst Robin Hoods ever with all the noise and silliness going on!

We found out the next day what happened when my aunt got home. As they came up the street she saw the single candles in each window. When the littlest one saw them she started running to the house. She burst in the door and started yelling all excited "Momma! Santa was here!" The tree was all lit up and the presents spilled out more than half way into the living room. While her children checked out the stuff under the tree my aunt went to the kitchen and found dinner in a crock-pot and when she checked the cupboards and the fridge she found food including the Christmas dinner.

My point? The feeling I had received playing Santa was the greatest gift I could have ever received. That memory stayed with us for a long time. I never forgot it. We didn't give her a handout, we gave her a hand up. I understood at that moment what was meant by it is better to give than to receive. This is why I support Operation Santa Claus. You will never be told by the recipient how much your gift is appreciated, but you will get a feeling you will want all the time that no pill, no drink, nothing! could ever give you.

My cousin, who was the three year old that yelled out excitedly that Santa Claus had come to their home, never forgot that night. When her children asked her if there really was a Santa Claus, my cousin said there was -- and to find him all you have to do is look in your heart and then she told them the story.

And all that trouble we went through to get a copy of her house key? My aunt had left the door unlocked when she took my cousins to Candlelight Services. She figured she had nothing left to steal.