A heartwarming Christmas story
My paternal grandfather was a curmudgeon throughout his entire life. Christmas seemed to aggravate the condition.
For nine or ten years, from the late 1950's through the mid-1960's, he taught at Gibbs High School here in Knox County (at that time, Gibbs housed grades 1 through 12 together in one building). One of those years, a few days before Christmas, he was assigned to work bus duty in front of the school, watching over all the kids getting on the bus. It was freezing cold, and all that Christmas cheer around him had gotten to be just too much to bear.
A first grader, whom I'll call "Little Jimmy" because I don't know his name, walked up to my shivering, Grinchy grandfather with an excited smile on his face. He was almost jumping for joy as he said, "Mr. McBee! Santa Claus comes next week!"
My grandfather said, "Get on that bus, kid. Haven't you heard? Santa Claus is dead."
Little Jimmy burst into tears and obediently boarded his bus.
The next morning, the principal called my grandfather into his office. He said, "Mack, did you tell Little Jimmy that Santa Claus is dead?" My grandfather sheepishly admitted that he did. The principal said, "You realize we'll have to work out an appropriate punishment ..."
A couple of days later, on the last day of school before Christmas break, everyone was gathered in the school auditorium for a school-wide assembly. Students, teachers, and parents gathered for a choral program and other holiday activities. Toward the end of it, the principal took to the lectern to address the audience. At the end of his remarks, he said, "Finally, we have a very special visitor today!"
At that moment, in walked Santa Claus with a large bag of presents for the younger kids. The first kid to get a present was Little Jimmy.
The man in the Santa outfit was my grandfather. That was his punishment.