By age two, our son was obsessed with being a hockey goalie. He carried a miniature hockey stick everywhere and insisted on wearing a bicycle helmet to preschool, believing it was a hockey helmet. Other parents questioned whether he belonged there.
When he turned four in 1992, we finally found a hockey program that would accept him. Every Saturday, we woke at 3:30 a.m. to drive an hour for a 5:00 a.m. ice slot.
Finding equipment small enough proved nearly impossible. My husband cut down sticks and modified pads. I resized jerseys and altered everything else. We stuffed paper into skates and padding into gloves just to make it all fit.
That fall, the rink let him join their youngest team and said he could play goalie if he had the equipment. We finally found old goalie pads that still needed alterations. But no amount of searching could locate a goalie blocker and glove small enough. Without these items, the rules wouldn’t allow him in goal.
As December approached, our son announced his solution: “I’ll ask Santa. Santa can have his elves make anything.”
My husband and I felt anguished. For weeks, we called every hockey shop in the U.S. and Canada, visited saddle makers and cobblers, and contacted every manufacturer we could find. The answer was always the same—no one made equipment that small.
As Christmas neared, I ordered a personalized jersey of his favorite team as a consolation gift, though the shop couldn’t guarantee it would arrive in time.
The week before Christmas, we took our son to see Santa at the mall. We had a plan: I would warn Santa beforehand that our son would ask for a glove and blocker that simply didn’t exist, and Santa would gently prepare him for disappointment. We chose this Santa for his experience.
I explained our dilemma, and Santa assured me he understood completely.
Then our son climbed onto Santa’s lap. When asked what he wanted for Christmas, he replied, “I want to be a goalie on my hockey team, but I can’t until I have a glove and blocker. My parents haven’t been able to find any in my size, but I know you can have your elves make them for me.”
Santa said, “Well, son, if you continue to be a very good young man, I think maybe you will just get your wish.”
My husband was furious. “How could Santa make such a promise?”
As we left, our son beamed. “See, I told you Santa would take care of everything!”
Days before Christmas, the hockey shop called—the jersey was delayed. Now there would be nothing our son wanted under the tree.
Late Christmas Eve afternoon, they called again. The jersey had arrived. “How late are you open?” I asked. It was nearly 5:00 p.m., and the shop was an hour away. Someone agreed to wait.
I arrived just after 6:00 p.m. The lights were dim, and I feared they’d closed, but the door was unlocked. Inside, no one was visible. “Hello? Is anyone here?”
An older gentleman emerged from the back room. He didn’t look like anyone I’d seen there before. In fact, he looked more like Santa than most Santas I’d ever seen.
“May I help you?” he asked. I explained about the jersey, and he retrieved it from under the counter. When I asked what I owed, he said, “Well, the receipt says $52 for the jersey, but it looks like there are also two other packages here with your name on them.”
He pulled out a perfectly miniaturized goalie glove and blocker.
“Where did you get these?” I gasped. “How much are they?”
“Does $25 each sound reasonable? Let’s just make it an even $100 for everything in the spirit of the season.”
The next morning, our son saw the blocker and glove first. He whirled around the room, waving his perfectly-fitting equipment. “I told you Santa would make them for me! Santa can do anything!”
A couple of days later, I returned to thank the staff. The same clerk who took my original order started apologizing—the jersey had just arrived today, he said, holding it up.
“But it did arrive! I picked it up Christmas Eve along with the glove and blocker.”
“Ma’am, what are you talking about? We closed at 2:00 p.m. on Christmas Eve.”
When I described the older gentleman with grey hair and a grey beard, the bewildered clerk said no one there matched that description. The owner confirmed it. I paid for the second jersey and left, noticing the window sign: “Closing at 2:00 p.m. on Christmas Eve.”
All these years later, maybe believing in the magic of the season is all we need to remember that there really are unexplainable, virtually unbelievable mysteries in life. Just believe!
