Letters from Santa's elves seek to bring normalcy to 2020's Christmas
Letters from Santa's elves seek to bring normalcy to 2020's Christmas
By Cary Littlejohn
Gillette News Record
Via Wyoming News Exchange
GILLETTE — It’s been about 10 years since Kaitlynn McKinsey, 18, wrote a letter to Santa in Brianne Pennington’s class at Pronghorn Elementary, but she still remembers it.
“I asked, ‘Why did you put a hole in the wall?’” McKinsey remembers. “I remember the previous Christmas, my dad had accidentally put a hole in the wall, and obviously he didn’t have time to fix it two hours before the sun rose.”
She said she remembers feeling a little accusatory about the hole, to the point she had “a little vendetta against Santa,” but since the letter she got back was from an elf, all was forgiven.
Now, she’s a part of the crew of deputized elves walking the halls of Thunder Basin High School who help Santa by responding to the overflow of letters he gets from local elementary students. The work is done by those in Claire Carter’s yearbook and journalism classes.
McKinsey’s memory of the experience is proof-positive that the letters make a meaningful difference.
“I didn’t think that we were going to get a letter back because obviously I’d written to Santa before. The day we came in and got them there were the letters on the desk and candy canes and I think she put glitter on the desks and stuff,” she said.
She remembers how the letter made her feel.
“It was nice because I was, like, a really shy kid when I was little,” McKinsey said. “It was nice to have an elf talking to me because it made me feel like I was special. I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, an elf likes me. An elf is my friend.’ Even though we’d only talked once to this elf, but I was like, ‘Obviously we are best friends.’”
Around a central table in Carter’s classroom, Alexis Groves and Talon Pfeil, both 17-year-old seniors, painstakingly craft handwritten responses in various colors that immediately lend a joyful quality to the words on the page.
Groves, who signs her letters using her elf name, Nutmeg, said the message to communicate is simple: “Santa loves them,” she said.
Pfeil, aka Jingle, said the key is being conversational with the kids.
“Just say, ‘I heard you guys got some snow in Gillette,’ and they’re just going to be like, ‘Whoa, they know we’re in Gillette!’” Pfeil said. “It’s just the little things that make (the letters) awesome.”
There also are rules, like never promising anything to the kids, which isn’t always hard because sometimes the kids just want to write to Santa to see how he’s doing, not ask for gifts.
Katelyn Mansheim, a 15-year-old sophomore who goes by the elf name Tinsel, showed off one student’s letter:
“I am bing good this yeer,” it reads. “I live in Gillette Wy. I go to Buffalo Ridge. It is my school. Have you been good Santa?”
The elves have learned to decipher (totally reasonable) kid spellings of words in letters that can elicit laughs and smiles one minute and tears of sadness the next.
One student had a few questions for Santa:
“Is Rudolf real? Is the kind of list real? Is misses Calse cookies really good? Is something magical in your bag? Please right back! Merry Chrismis to you. Oh and hide the presents.”
Some were just looking out for their families.
“My wish is if you can pless make my mom stop having propram with her eyes that wode be good and pless make my famling to hafe a good Chrismis and make my mom hafe a lote of presints.”
And others were doubtful about the whole exercise but the kids were hedging their bets just in case.
“Dear Santa, I don’t believe you, so please don’t bring me coal. But if are real, then give me stickbots and mincraft java edition. Also i think its a crime that people are impersonating you. Merry Christmas!”
The elves in Carter’s class were hopeful that the letters brought the kids a sense of normalcy to Christmas in a year that’s been difficult for so many in the community due to COVID-19 and jobs-related issues.
“It feels more normal,” McKinsey said. “Because, for a lot of people, Christmas isn’t happening. It feels better to have at least some kind of normalcy to write this letter and know that it’s going to someone and not really have to think about the other stuff, like what you’re going to do for Christmas or what they’re going to do for Christmas.
“You’re just reading what you’re reading and you’re able to respond to that and make their Christmas better even if they lost someone in their family or they’re not going to be able to get together with their family or they miss their dad or they can’t get this for Christmas because their parents lost their job. It’s nice to give them at least something normal.”
Carter’s students also recognize that writing the letters did as much for them as it did for the students receiving the letters.
“It definitely just makes you feel happy yourself,” Pfeil said. “It gets you into the season as well. Because of all this bad stuff that’s been going on, not a lot of people are looking forward to it. It just makes me happy. Christmas is the best time of year.”