Why is Santa Claus Fat?

The question of Santa's girth was posed to me the other day by a woman who was born and raised in India.   She's a lovely woman who has lived in this country for many years, raising her own children here.  We were working together at the tax office,  chatting and joking between clients.

"Linda, why is Santa Claus fat?" Sawsan asked during a lull in the business.  "When my children were little I had to give my husband a pillow to wear under his Santa outfit.  Why is that?"

I thought for a minute.  "I really don't know."

Questions like this one, fascinate me.  If any of you have read my book reviews, you may have noticed a pattern of my selections.  Learning about foreign cultures is my passion.  I love to travel and experience language, food and people that I don't have at home.  I read alot of books especially about Asia, a place I've always felt a strong connection to.

American children are raised on Santa, therefore as adults we take him for granted.  We never think twice about why he has a beard, wears a red suit and lives at the North Pole where is is so beastly cold the fire in the fireplace burns year round twenty four hours a day.  In other words we assume Santa never gets sick or runs out of gifts and on Christmas morning our stockings will be filled with lots of goodies.  So I set out on a mission to answer Sawsan's question.  I bet even Santa doesn't like to be taken for granted.

Santa, it seems became fat with the poem, The Night Before Christmas by C. Clement Moore.  The classic line is 'He had a little round belly, that shook when he laughed like a bowl full of jelly'.  Santa didn't have reindeer either until Mr. Moore added them.  The Coca Cola people capitalized on the poem by creating a a round, jolly Santa for their advertising.   The image stuck. I found one more interesting tidbit on Wikipedia, that mentioned, L. Frank Baum, of Wizard of Oz fame.  He wrote a Christmas story about a Santa who lived in the Laughing Valley of the Hohaho.  I couldn't pin this down, but it seems this may be where the 'Ho Ho Ho' came from. Santa doesn't say 'ho ho ho' in The Night Before Christmas.

I called my sister, Martha today.  She's an expert on all things Santa with three grandchildren who are over the top excited waiting for Christmas Day. I asked her this same Santa question and she rattled off C. Clement Moore and Coca Cola with precision.  She didn't know about L. Frank Baum but I figured two out of three was a passing with flying colors, grade.

"You passed the test." I congratulated her.

"I didn't know I was taking a test," she grumbled.  "So here's yours. What's the story behind the candy cane?"

Back to the drawing board I go.  I bought a box of 88 cent candy canes at Walmart yesterday.  I love peppermint so much I really should know why we shape it like a cane.  Martha arrives on Christmas Day so I still have a few days to find the answer. I'm sending a big Merry Christmas thank you to Sawsan for helping me to see that Christmas is a magical time  filled with many blessings and I will never ever take it for granted again. More Christmas questions anyone???