For all of those who have been anxiously waiting to find out the answer to the question, "Why is Santa in Chicago on July 31?", here is the conclusion:

Santa takes a deep breath and laughs, shaking his head.  I feel like a moron.  He says, “I’ll answer your question when you answer mine.  ‘What’s your story?’”

Dejected, deflated, and discontent, I take a bite of my burger and move some chips around in their basket.  For whatever reason, I decide to stay at the table when I really want to leave.  I could at least force some words out of my mouth to humor the geezer.  After I swallow, I gulp down some beer.  I think to myself, “Man, I don’t think there’s enough beer in this place to make me comfortable with this situation.” And then, I speak.

“Well, first you should know I hate being called ‘Maggie.’ My dad called my Maggie.  He took off when I was seven.  He decided he wanted to pursue a different life.  For whatever reason, he thought it was cute to sing that song, ‘Maggie May’ to me when he left.  You know the song that begins ‘Wake up Maggie I think I’ve got something to say to you.  It’s late September and I really should be back at school…’ Not exactly the most appropriate material for a good-bye.  I haven’t seen him since.  I’d really appreciate it if you’d call me by my middle name, Julia, instead.”

Mr. Clause nods and wrestles with a mouthful of his second burger.  Man he can put the food away.

“So anyway, I blame my father for the situation I’m in.  I mean, after all, if the man had stuck around for my childhood, I probably wouldn’t have the strange abandonment issues that I have.  My family, I just don’t talk to them anymore.  My mother, she’s the sort of woman who bakes cookies for the neighbors while she talks about how terrible they are.  My younger sister is a stockbroker and my younger brother is a graduate student in philosophy at Penn State.  I’m just the screw up who didn’t fit in with the family, dropped out of college, and lost her job.”

Santa picks up his glass.  “Do you want more beer? I’m getting more.  Sounds like I’ll – er – you’ll need it.” When he returns with the frosted glasses filled with sorrow-drowning alcohol, (at least what we could get here in the middle of the day) he sits down and asks, “So how did you lose your job?”

I sigh, take a sip of the beer – the bartender got a bit too much head on it this time – and then pick up a chip.  “That’s a long story.  Let’s just say I slept with the wrong person, it went horribly, and the boss was very unhappy with me about the whole thing.”

“Yes, that’s juicy.  Let’s talk about that.”

“I have an idea, let’s talk about you, why you’re wearing a Santa suit in the middle of summer, and tromping about town barging into people’s personal lives.” I shove more food in my face and chew slowly.

He shrugs, “That wouldn’t be as interesting.”  The crazy lady with a staring problem is making her way towards us. She plops down next to fatty and puts her hand over his.  He looks at her. 

“Do I know you from somewhere?”  She asks.  I hold back laughter.  Partly because it would be impolite, mostly because if I laugh now bits of triple cheeseburger would fly everywhere, as I just took a generous bite.

“I’m Santa Clause.”

“Oh darling, I’m being serious.” She laughs.

“So am I.” Santa’s face is as serious as an axe through the head.

“If you’re Santa, aren’t you a little early?”

He shrugs, “I like Chicago.  You can get awesome burgers here.”

By this time, I’m done eating my first burger and most of the fries.  “You’re here for the burgers?” 

“Not just the burgers, I’m going to go watch the Cubs lose in a little bit too.  They need all the support they can get.”

The lady looks at him and then at me and then at him again.  “You are both insane.”  She stands up, returns to her table, picks up her purse and is waving her hands madly and laughing in front of her friends.

“You’re seriously here for the burgers and the Cubs?”

“You were telling me a story?”

I sigh.  “Let me go to the restroom first. Give me a minute.”   When I return, I sit down, put my hands on the table and stare at the second burger.  “I’m going to take that one with me, I think.” Santa nods, “So yes, I start dating this guy at work.  Granted, he was in the midst of going through a bitter divorce because, well, his wife claimed he beat her.  Well, claimed wasn’t the right word – that’s his side of the story.  Truth was, he did beat her.  I was just too stupid to see the red flags even when he sent me to the hospital with broken ribs..  I took pity on him.  Moved him in.  Told myself he was only angry and violent because of the situation with the ex. A year passed.  Two years passed.  Nothing got better. One day, three years in, he got fired from work for drinking on the job.  You can’t drink on the job, especially not in construction.  His mistake killed a young college student when a beam fell on him.  I got home later that night to find that my accounts wiped out, my home ransacked, my valuables gone, and an eviction notice on my door.  Evidently Lloyd made enough of an exit to cause me to lose my home.”

Santa gulped down his beer.  No wonder he had a belly full of jelly.  “So then what happened?”

“Well, I went to work the next day and I was fired.  Turns out Lloyd had been stealing from the company using my login information.  Even though they decided not to press charges against me because they did find and arrest him, I had violated the company’s policies on inter-departmental dating.  Effectively, I had no home and no job.  When I called my family members and asked them if I could crash with them, each one had reasons why I couldn’t.  So, here I am.  I ride the El.  Sometimes people give me enough so that I can stay in a cheap hotel for a few days.  I get by.  It’s not easy finding a job when you have no address for the application.  I’d love to get on my feet again.  It’s been three months.  It’ll be cold again soon.  I have no idea what I’ll do then.”

“You’ll be fine,” Santa said, “this is only temporary.”

“Yeah, right.”

“You’ve got to be more positive about things.”

“Says the man who brings joy to millions of children every year.”

“Says the man who knows what it’s like to be down on his luck.  You forget that I got into the business by helping out the poor and hungry.”

“I wasn’t raised with Santa Clause.  I don’t know the whole story.”

“Well, let’s just say that I don’t just don presents on children.”

“Ok.”  I finish my beer and stand up. 

“Don’t you want to know why I’m here, in Chicago?”

“Are you actually going to tell me?”

“You kept your end, I keep my end.”

“So why are you here?”  I watch the lady and her friends leave The Billy Goat Tavern still laughing and blabbering about their lunchtime adventures.

“I tour the world during the summer to help out the poor and downtrodden.  People often forget about them when it’s not the holidays and someone’s got to help them keep their hopes up.”

“Oh,” I nod, “Oooh! I get it.”

“So, Mag-er-Julia, would you like to go to a Cubs game? I have an extra ticket.”


THE END