ALEX CANTATORE

Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m certainly beginning to feel a whole lot more ho, ho, ho-ier as I flick open those little windows on my advent calendar, revealing those oh-so delicious morsels of chocolate, and tick off the days towards Dec. 25.

Certainly, the fog is helping my holiday mood. It’s the Valley equivalent of snow, as you well know. But I think there’s something a little more special that’s urging me to don my obnoxiously jolly Christmas vest this year.

Something a little more… Secret, if you will.

Parents, if you’re letting your kids read my columns, you should probably stop them now. There are ahem spoilers, if you will.

When it comes to office holiday traditions, I’ve always been a proponent of the white elephant, Yankee Swap sort of gift giving. You know the game; everyone brings something completely random (racquetball goggles, bum wine, perhaps a ceramic clown from the thrift store) and then people spend an evening stealing gifts from one another in hopes of obtaining something marginally decent.

But this year, as I’m going to be out of the country while the rest of my office mates are dining on a sumptuous Italian dinner, I was allowed no input on the Christmas party. And, in retrospect, I think it might have been for the best.

One of our advertising salespersons, Mo Jerner, proposed that we do Secret Santas this year rather than the Yankee Swap we employed last year. And while I bemoaned this fact at the time, upset that I would no longer be able to crush the souls of my coworkers by stealing their precious scented candles, I now look across my desk at the loot my Secret Santa brought me and see the errors of my ways.

This whole Secret Santa thing started out innocently enough. We’d come in to work in the morning and there’d be a bag on someone’s desk. As if by magic.

Contained within would be all sorts of goodies. Candy. Starbucks. Little stuffed penguins. Everything that you’d ever wanted, it seemed.

The office started buzzing. Those whose Secret Santas had been slacking started complaining, while those who had been Santaed excitedly showed off their goods to any coworker who would listen.

And, surprisingly enough, save for a few spoilsports everyone’s done a great job of keeping the Santas secret.

I feel like I’m 8 years old again. Every gift is such a surprise, so unexpected, so magical.

It’s not like we’re giving big ticket items here, but I think I was as excited to get a penguin calendar and a box of tea as I was to get a bike when I was little.

Once you know the big secret, Christmas is never as much fun. Sure, it’s great to see your family, it’s delicious to eat far too much food, and it’s fun to give and get presents.

But there’s always something missing, that mystical feeling of a person you’ve never met who somehow knows exactly what to get you, and goes out of his way to make you happy. The feeling of awe you once got when you woke up on Christmas morning, seeing the house transformed with countless packages and crumbs from the cookies you left for Santa.

This silly little office gift giving has given something back to me. A sense of wonder at small things, and a wave of joy that I’ll feel whenever I pick up my Santa-themed coffee cup.

So, yes. Santa may not be real. But this holiday season, my coworkers have turned even bah-humbuggery me into a Santa hat wearing fool.

And if that’s not a Christmas miracle, then I don’t know what is.

To contact Alex Cantatore, e-mail acantatore@turlockjournal.com or call 634-9141 ext. 2005.

Originally published in the Turlock Journal 12/12/2008.
Retrieved from the Turlock Journal Web site.