If you believe in God, should you believe in Santa Claus too?

Perhaps a Serling-type moment:

STRANGE TEA

[A stranger went hiking in an unfamiliar wood one day where he came upon a tiny trail, no more than three hands wide that seemed to disappear in a tangle of brush and bramble; he stepped with a tepid foot and went forward as the path went round a sharp bend and before him he saw a tiny bower.

Trepidation and temptation tugged at his sleeve, pulling this way and that until at last, curiosity took over , pushing him down on his haunches where he crept, slouching and shuffling forward to see where it would lead. After several long minutes and through a few aches of aging muscles grown soft with disuse and much musing, he spied a bright light.

Leaning as far as he dared he clawed at the musty earth underneath and straightened at last to his full height; squinting at first to get used to the light he slowly swung his head both left and then right whereupon he saw a small cabin carved entirely from the materials at hand.

Rubbing his eyes, he fought with his mind, “I’m growing quite mad,” he thought.

His fear now forgotten and his curiosity controlling, he strolled purposely forward and boldly tapped at the small front door carved delicately from the slab of a lightning struck tree that still stood proudly as it served as the front porch canopy of this nature’s cabin lair.

His knock was answered with a swing and a creak and there in the archway was a pair of fat-tummied cheeks surrounding a small nose and red little lips and from deep somewhere inside this opening, came a greeting sincere.

“What took you so long, we thought you’d never get here.”

His host motioned him over to a too-tiny chair that supported his forearms as he eased back to sit and swelled just enough to swaddle his overstuffed seat.

He looked all around from his station where gravity and too much gravy had him nearly glued tight inside, his thighs being made corduroy by the wicker-like reeds woven throughout the furniture he shared with the three cherubs.

A settee at one wall, his own perch across and two smaller chairs; a chopped trunk of an oak shaved slivery-smooth, set up with a buffet of snacks and cups of what must have been tea.

Before he could answer, his host darted quickly to the fruit-laden table and returned with a cup and a saucer made of dried gourd and big leaves and drank deeply from his own nearby.

“You’ve been expecting me?”

“Oh, yes, we knew you’d come, they always come, we’d be ever so lonely otherwise, you see.”

“Why me?”

“You’re one of them.”

“Them? What’s “them?”

“Why, you, of course.”

“I see.”

Beginning to regret his curiosity earlier, the stranger began to take in his surrounding in more detail, the doorway stood open, a small window ajar; another larger door in the farthest wall, and a curtained opening to a darker area that seemed oddly empty as far as the deep shadows could tell.

“Is it what you hoped for?”

“It’s a bit small, I’m afraid, but tidy, quiet and comforting, indeed.”

“You may not be ready; perhaps you should follow me back.”

With that, he arose and the chair slid noiselessly to the bare earthen floor and now the back door was open and the light beckoned beyond. He turned to say goodbye to his host and found that the cabin had slipped all away, leaving him standing at the edge of the wood once more.

“How was your walk, dear?”

“I’m strangely thirsty”, he mumbled.

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