Every parent of a child who holds visions of sugar plums in their head knows that the Warwick Mall Santa is the best Santa. The twinkle in his eye is as real as his beard, and his silent communication with parents is as good as the across-the-room signals between you and your mate when you’re ready to leave a party. Fight us.
So we paid the best part of Warwick a visit to see how Santa’s dealing with COVID, despite Dr. Fauci’s assertions that the jolly old elf is immune.
Rather than sit on his lap, masked kids will sit near Santa and make their Christmas wishes from a safe distance, and Santa upgraded his hat to include a face shield. We observed a few visits, and the face shields and masks didn’t seem to matter. The kids’ joy and the thrill of seeing and talking to Santa was just as powerful as always. You couldn’t see the smiles, but you could hear the giggles and see little eyes get big when they saw him.
Should parents dress kids up in their finest for their visit with St. Nick? As long as we’re breaking tradition, we suggest dressing them in sweats or pajamas, skipping the comb, and adding a festive mask to perfectly capture the memory of 2020.