The Year I Met the Real Saint Nicholas

G rowing up in the U.S. of A., one runs across many people who dress up like the American Santa Claus depicted in the Coca-Cola ads inspired by the old Thomas Nast illustrations. These faux Clauses can be seen ringing bells next to Salvation Army buckets, waving in front of used car establishments, and sitting in malls. They all may seem like the real McCoy—until you meet the genuine article.

Sandra Boynton, in her book Christmastime, urges her readers to avoid those turkeys whose stunted imaginations make it impossible to accept the existence of Kris Kringle. In defense of these poor souls, I think if I had never met the real Saint Nicholas, I’d find myself in the same boat. Thankfully, in 1998 I had a magical moment when I spoke with the real Saint Nick. I would pass the incident off in my head as the product of too much wine—but my wife, Leslie, and my daughter, Carey, met him too! Here is what happened . . .

It was two weeks before Christmas and two months before the birth of our second daughter, Maggie. We had just finished our annual Christmas dinner with Arrowpointe Designworks (my friend and employer at the time), and as I was walking out to get the car from the dark alley next to the restaurant when a man walked by me and wished me a “Merry Christmas.” I returned the greeting as I turned to get a look at him. As I did, the man was illuminated by a pool of streetlights. It was then that I knew I had just met the bona fide original, after which all the copies I had experienced in my life up until that point were based. He wore the biggest, heaviest boots—old boots with the tops turned down, such as I had only seen in picture books and in “Trodden Weed,” the painting by Andrew Wyeth. He had a beard but it wasn’t too white or too flowing or too long—all details which would have been a giveaway that it wasn’t the real Saint Nicholas. He was also wearing small, wire- rimmed spectacles, but all of these details were just icing on the cake (or, one might say, tinsel on the tree). What really made me realize that I was in the presence of the original, honest-to-goodness true Santa Claus was his clothing.  He wore a long white robe, richly embroidered with a matching hood. The workmanship and design had a bit of a Scandinavian or Norse look to it, and it was obvious that it was ancient. It clearly had been used for centuries—the sort of thing you could only find in a museum nowadays.

All of this happened in a split second. He then kept walking out of the alley, turning right at the old candy factory and then proceeded north, up Queen Street towards our old railway station.

Like I said, I would’ve thought it had all been a dream, but then Leslie and Carey came out of the restaurant and spoke with him. He even gave Carey a candy cane. After talking with him, the girls and I bundled into our car and went shopping at our local Giant grocery store, an incredibly boring, mundane thing to do in the wake of the most magical Christmas moment ever!

So when people tell me Santa is just pretend or is simply mom and dad, I just smile. I understand—I myself have even dressed up and pretended to be Santa Claus once or twice. But they never met the real Saint Nicholas like I did. And if by chance you purchase my Saint Nicholas the Giftgiver book and expect to see what ol’ Kris Kringle really looks like, I must warn you that in that book I drew him in a way that is much closer to the Santa Claus found in our collective Rankin/Bass-influenced imaginative popular culture, because I knew folks would never be able to accept what the real Saint Nicholas looks like, since they have not seen him as I have.

Saint Nicholas the Giftgiver by Ned Bustard

Ned Bustard

Ned Bustard is a graphic designer, children’s book illustrator, author, and printmaker. Some of the books include Bible History ABCs: God’s Story from A to Z, Revealed: A Storybook Bible for Grown-Ups, History of Art: Creation to Contemporary, The O in Hope, Saint Nicholas the Giftgiver, The Light Princess, The Lost Tales of Sir Galahad, and volumes I–III of Every Moment Holy. 

Ned is the creative director for World’s End Images and Square Halo Books, Inc., curates the Square Halo Gallery, is an elder at Wheatland Presbyterian Church, and serves on the boards of both the Association of Scholars of Christianity in the History of Art (ASCHA) and The Row House, Inc.

He has three daughters, two dogs, and an unreasonable amount of books. Ned lives in the West End of Lancaster, Pennsylvania—much too far inland for him to get to go sailing. Learn more at www.WorldsEndImages.com

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