Romancing Mrs. Claus

The Christmas season was upon us and the kids wanted to see Santa. What kid doesn't? And I knew that it was a good sign. If they were still depressed and living in their mother's departure, they wouldn't want to sit on Santa's lap. They wouldn't have the hope and anticipation of the Christmas season.

It was a Friday night. "Come on, dad! We're ready! Santa isn't going to wait all night!" Not five seconds passed and then, "Dad? Are you coming?"

"I'm comin', I'm comin'!" Well, I said they had youthful enthusiasm and overwhelming energy, didn't I? They were climbing into the car as I locked the front door and jogged to the curb. I heard that the local mall had a great Santa this year, so we hopped in the car and headed out with plans to grab a pizza on the way home. When we got to the mall the parking lot was crowded. The Christmas shopping season was in full force. We searched for and found a parking space, walked to the mall entrance, and found the line to Santa's lap. Every kid in town must have been there that night. The line alone took 45 minutes that seemed like hours with two overly stimulated kids who literally could not stand still. They hopped from one foot to another as they recited their well-memorized Christmas lists.

As we got to the front of the line, I realized that I had not been fully informed about this particular Santa Claus. More specifically, it wasn't Santa. It was Mrs. Claus. We waited in line for forty-five minutes to meet Mrs. Claus. The kids were confused, and I was unprepared. "Well, you know that Santa is very busy, and he has a lot of helpers, but sometimes Mrs. Claus needs to step up and help him. I bet she's really wonderful and if anyone can tell Santa what you want for Christmas, I bet it's Mrs. Claus." That seemed to ease their concerns. Catastrophe avoided.

As we were one child away from the big moment, I looked at Mrs. Claus and I couldn't help but think I'd seen her before. I was staring at her when she looked in our direction, I caught her eye, and she smiled. Where have I seen her before? Then it hit me. Under that wig and makeup, take away the granny glasses and the grandmotherly red dress, it was Bridget. My lawyer, the shark, was Mrs. Claus.

Standing there, I watched her work as she glance occasionally in my direction, and I finally thought to close my gaping mouth, swallow, and said to the kids, "Tell Mrs. Claus that we would like to buy her a hot cocoa when she gets a break."

Their eyes lit up with excitement! "We can do that?"

"We can always ask, and I think she might say 'Yes'."

I stood to the side and watched my kids with all their innocence on display pour their hearts out to Mrs. Claus. As they were finishing, Debbie summoned her courage and invited Mrs. Claus to have cocoa with her family. I watched as Bridget looked in my direction, smiled, and then nodded to my daughter. The excitement of leaving the house was nothing compared to the overwhelming anticipation I saw in my children's faces at that moment. Bridget held up five fingers which I took to me five minutes, so I gathered my overly excited kids, found some seats in the food court, and awaited the arrival of Mrs. Claus.

I expected something resembling bedlam when Bridget arrived, but it was the oddest thing. Sitting on her chair with the children lined up, she was the focus of everyone's attention. Walking through the mall, she was just another Christmas ornament. She seemed to pass by the young families almost unnoticed, but she was far from ignored by my two little ones when she arrived at our table. I worked hard to suppress my grin.

Never in my life did I imagine I would be holding a chair as Mrs. Claus sat to have cocoa with my family. "Mrs. Claus, it's so good of you to join us. I know you have a busy schedule, but these two were so excited to meet you that we wanted to thank you."

She looked at Debbie and Georgie. Debbie was all smiles and swinging her legs nervously under her chair while Georgie was wide-eyed and speechless. "Well, Henry, your children are so well behaved that I couldn't resist the chance to spend a few minutes with your family."

"You know our daddy's name?"

"Well, of course I do, Georgie. Your father has been sending his letters to Santa for many years and we know him well."

Well, if he was excited before, he was over the moon now.

"And what about you, Henry? What do you want for Christmas?"

"Well, Mrs. Claus, I think this year I'll just be grateful for what I already have. A very sweet lady named Bridget saved what I value most. I don't think I need anything more than that."

Her face beamed and her smile was radiant. There was no question in my mind that this shark had a heart. She turned to my children and asked, "And what about you two? What plans do you have for the Christmas holiday?"

They looked despondent. "We have to go visit our mother and her boyfriend."

"I'm sure she is looking forward to seeing you. Does her boyfriend treat you well?"

They didn't notice it, but with that simple comment I saw the lawyer looking after the welfare of my children. If they gave her the wrong answer, she was ready to go after him.

"He's okay. He pretty much ignores us."

"Mommy doesn't act the way she used to."

"Why, what do you mean, Debbie?"

"She's always distracted. She keeps looking at her boyfriend and ignoring us."

"We don't see her very much, anyway, so it doesn't matter."

Bridget tried to hide it, but I could see the sadness in her eyes. My children weren't so young that they couldn't remember life before their mother left.

"And what about your father? Do you have any plans with him?"

"Oh, yes! We are spending Christmas morning with daddy and then we're going to visit our grandparents. And we're going to see some Christmas gardens where they have trains and mountains and little buildings..."

"Dad says we can get our Christmas tree tomorrow and decorate it. We've already started putting up the decorations around the house. Oh, and dad says that this year Georgie and I can have some eggnog!"

She looked over at me questioning the last statement and smiling. I just smiled and shook my head.

"Dad, you promised!"

"I know and we will make eggnog together, I promise." That seemed to make her happy.

"Well, I need to get back. There are a lot of good little children who I need to see tonight."

"Do you ever get any bad children?" Georgie laughed as he said it.

"Oh, Georgie, all children are good. You must know that by now." My two were beaming at that remark. I guess they thought it improved their chances.

As Mrs. Claus rose from her chair, she turned to me and said, "Now, Henry, don't you be a stranger."

"No, Mrs. Claus, now that you've met my two, I promise I won't be."

Bridget smiled a knowing smile, turned, and walked back to her chair and the long line of children waiting to speak with Mrs. Claus. I had never noticed before that moment what a lovely way of walking Mrs. Claus had. It was graceful and with just a little sway to hold my attention. Why had I not noticed that before?

My young family sat and finished our cocoa with far more excitement than I'd seen in any of us for a very long time.

"Dad, are you sure Mrs. Claus will tell Santa what we want for Christmas?"

"Oh, I think he'll get the message. She seems to know what she's doing."

With their fears relieved and still with far too much excitement, we headed out to find a pizza for dinner.

I waited a few days so I wouldn't seem too desperate, and I didn't want to interrupt Bridget with a phone call while she was with a client, so I had flowers sent to her office. On the card I wrote, "If Mrs. Claus has an evening off, I would love to take Bridget to dinner sometime." She called later that day and we made a date for Saturday night. I picked her up at her home and took her to a place I'd heard about, but never visited. I didn't want old memories intruding into our evening. The specialty of the house is a filet mignon topped by a crab cake and Hollandaise sauce with winter vegetables and piped potatoes and we shared a crème brulee for dessert. The food was great, and the conversation was lively. The thoughtful lawyer who spoke in measured tones was gone and instead, I was out with a lively and animated woman who fascinated me with every remark. It was a lovely evening.

I thought I shouldn't try to make too much of our first date, but as we were leaving the restaurant Bridget said, "So, are you taking me dancing or are you going to wimp out on me?" It's amazing what a woman can say with a smile that makes a man feel great about himself.

"So, what do you like, country and western or rock and roll?"

"I like slow dances."

For a guy who hadn't been on a real date in what seemed like a lifetime, I was doing pretty well. We danced the rest of the evening and when I dropped her off at her home, she made me promise that we would do it again soon. It was a promise I intended to keep.

That was the start of my new life. I would still have my moments of pain and doubt. The kids and I would all still struggle with the new normal and I was still pulled between the demands of my career and the needs of my kids. There was a lot to work out, but I was beginning to understand that this was life and life was good.

Two months after our first date I officially introduced Bridget to my children. There were moments when I caught them looking at her as if they should know her but could not place the face. That soon passed, and she became their favorite person in the world. Whenever Bridget was coming over, they became as animated as they were when they first met Mrs. Claus. Funny how that happened...

Maggie seemed to drift into second place in my kid's lives. She never stopped being their mother, and I always respected her role in their lives, but her priorities were somewhere else. They knew it, I knew it, and even Bridget admitted that she saw it coming back when we were negotiating the divorce. Bridget teamed with Karen to provide the female role models that my kids needed.

As our relationship deepened, we faced the predictable problem of growing our relationship while still maintaining a façade of respectability for the kids. In other words, Bridget wasn't spending the nights and we were having an increasing number of dates at her place. I wanted more than that, but a single father needs to walk the line in front of young kids.

Change came eight months after our first date. By then, the kids had turned to Bridget as their mother in everything but name, and I saw that there was only one path forward toward happiness for us all. We had put the two little ones to bed, and Bridget and I were sitting on the sofa enjoying some wine.

"I've started to really miss those two when I'm home."

"They talk about you all the time."

Bridget chuckled quietly. "Debbie called me the other night to ask me about the boys in her class. It seems they don't have a very high opinion of girls."

"That will change."

"That's what I told her. She didn't like how long I told her it would take."

We had a quiet moment. I was enjoying just sitting with her.

Bridget was dropping some big hints. "I wish I could see them more often."

"You know, we're a package deal. You want them, I come along for the ride."

That brought a smile to her face. "I think I could deal with that."

I slipped to the floor on one knee, drew the ring box from my pocket, and asked, "Bridget, would you do me the honor of becoming my wife?" It takes a lot to shock a lawyer, but for the first time she was speechless. It didn't last long.

A few seconds later she caught her breath and said "Yes, Henry! Absolutely yes!"

Well, that's how I did it. I wasn't smooth, but what I lacked in grace I made up for in sincerity. We told the kids the next day and they leapt into her lap with hugs and giggles.

Epilogue:

I'd like to say that life was perfect after that, and all our problems were in the past, but life isn't like that. There were problems and challenges as there always are. The biggest problem came three years later when Maggie found herself kicked to the curb. Her lawyer boyfriend, who had never married her, was cheating on her as he had cheated on Glenda with Maggie and cheated on Bridget with Glenda, only Maggie didn't see it coming. She tried to bounce back to her family, but we had formed a new family by that time. Bridget insisted on respecting Maggie's role as the mother to our children and the kids went along as far as they could, but in their hearts only Bridget was their true mother, and I couldn't argue with that. Life settled into yet another new normal. The kids adjusted quickly as I did eventually, and the family flourished.

Eventually, and with Bridget's help, I came to realize that assigning blame was a wasted effort. We expanded our hearts, adjusted to change, and built our family on love. Three years after we married, Bridget gave me another daughter that we named Claire. Maggie eventually found someone to marry with a suitable degree of social importance and income. He was an okay sort and we have them over for cookouts and such from time to time. When there is love in the family, the other things don't matter.

So that's my story of how I came to romance Mrs. Claus. Bridget is still a lawyer and she still handles the kind of divorces that bring sadness and rage to normal people. Somehow, she gets her clients through it, watching over them, protecting them, and doing her best to get them what they deserve. When the Christmas season approaches, she dons her wig and glasses, the makeup and the dress, and she becomes Mrs. Claus to all the little kids at the mall who need to get their wish list to Santa. I take the kids someplace else to see Santa. Debbie is having her doubts, but it's still too soon for Georgie and Claire to see behind the curtain and we want them to stay young and keep their innocence a little longer. In other words, we're a pretty average family and I wouldn't have it any other way.