It's more about presence than presents

“I didn’t become Santa,” says Joe Murphy. “This girl made me Santa.”

The young girl Joe is talking about is Vada, a neighbor of the Murphy family in Blue Island.

“My daughter had me at our store (Three Sisters Antiques) from 5 to 8 o’clock. Around 7:55 p.m. I’m looking at my watch and just praying for 8 o’clock to come because I am sweating bullets in this suit. At 8 o’clock I run upstairs—we live upstairs from the store—to take off this outfit when my daughter calls me asking if I’m still dressed because there is a little girl who just came in. So, I ran down and here is this little girl, Vada, waiting for me,” he said. “I just knelt and said hello. I told her I was so happy I got to see her before I went up north again. And she is standing there with these flowers she brought for Santa.”

The next day while he was at work his daughter texted him the picture Vada’s parents sent to her. “I saw it and I just started crying. I’ve never seen myself, you know, as Santa and to see this child with the look on her face. It was just unbelievable,” he said. “I didn’t become Santa. This girl made me Santa.”

Rewind a year or so and Joe tells how he got started.

“What inspired me was my daughter's trickery,” Joe said. He said he and his family rarely took long vacations because of his job but in 2018 they went to Tennessee, South Carolina, and North Carolina for two weeks. “It was wonderful. And during the vacation, my children said, ‘Man, dad, your beard grows fast’. And begrudgingly I said, Yeah, kind of stinks because I always shave twice a day or I have a five o'clock shadow. This was in October, and they said, ‘why don’t you not shave until Christmas?’ I said yes. Then a month goes by, and I get a big package in the mail. It was a Santa suit from my daughters. They decided since we’ve never had a Santa at Three Sisters, I could be the Santa.”

His first gig was at Moraine Valley Community College, where he serves as a Board of Education trustee. He said yes so he could test the waters to see if he could pull off this new role and do it effectively at his store. “I remember driving home from the party in my Santa suit and decided to stop at Lori Campione’s house—the woman who has been Mrs. Claus for 30-plus years. It was the first time I was in that suit, and I wanted to know what she thought. I was thrilled and excited like I’m really meeting Mrs. Claus!” he said.

He was happy he stopped. “She’s royalty. And she’s wonderful because her full-time job is a kindergarten teacher so who better to be around children? She knows how they think, how to talk to them and what toys are popular,” he said. Joe’s dream was to one day be able to work with her. And that dream has come true, as they’ve worked side-by-side quite a bit at numerous parties, events and stores.

Many of those appearances have been in Orland Park bringing cheer to people right in their homes and at the “Breakfast with Mrs. Claus and the Princesses” at Silver Lake Country Club.

Not only did Mrs. C think he looked the part—she had a good tip for him. “She told me I had to get a key and hang It from my suit. She explained there’s a lot of children who don’t have chimneys so the first thing they ask Santa is how do I get into their house? That’s when you pull out the key and tell them it’s a magic Christmas key that unlocks any door in the world,” he said. “It was things like this that made me think, wow, I’ve got a lot to learn.”

For starters, he had to find himself a new Santa suit.

“I only did a few events the first year but then I was looking for Santa outfits. The outfit my girls got me was this $99 Amazon Santa suit. I never felt like I was fat enough so I took a pillow right off my bed and would stick it underneath the suit. But then it gave me a square chest. So, I’d take a sweater or another shirt and put it over it. Well, then you put on the Santa suit and now you’re just sweating bullets. So, after the first year I knew I had to find another Santa suit,” he said.

While searching the internet for some proper festive apparel, Joe came across sites for Santa schools. He found one in Michigan and another in Colorado and signed up for their mailing list. “I got an email from the lady in Denver saying she was going to be in Chicago doing a weekend Santa seminar. So, I thought this was great that I didn’t have to go to Michigan or Denver. Instead, I went to a Holiday Inn in Westmont for two days.”

Joe said he was “blown away” with all he was learning. “She was teaching us everything, from how you look to how you act, how to put on your make up, the possibility of learning sign language—everything. I remember the second day I texted my daughters and told them I will never yell at them for being in the bathroom too long because I just spent three hours putting on makeup myself.”

Joe admits there’s a lot to learn about this role as Santa so he keeps up as best he can. He’s a member of the Worldwide Santa Claus Network, a group that offers opportunities to communicate with hundreds of Santas worldwide. He also attends a networking event with this group every week with roughly 50 to 75 others who bring cheer to children (and adults) each Christmas season. “I’m always trying to learn more,” Joe said.

During his first year as Santa, Joe made two appearances. But the list has grown extensively over the past few years. “In 2019 I was the Santa at the Drake Hotel in Chicago. It was absolutely spectacular. Six hours of complete joy,” he said. “I was on cloud-9.”

He’s been the Santa at Nordstrom’s on Michigan Avenue, for the Polar Express event at a local church and at Gaelic Park for a dance event. He also fulfilled a last-minute request on Christmas Eve for a young man who was proposing marriage to his girlfriend. “I always ask the kids if there’s anything special Santa can bring them on Christmas and so I asked him, too, if there was anything special I could bring him. He gets off my lap and says, ‘Yeah, can you help me have Kathy become my wife?’ Then he proposes. It was really special to be a part of that,” Joe said.

To date, he’s made more than 50 appearances at businesses, homes, schools, churches, and community events throughout the southwest suburbs. “The reaction I get from children and adults—it’s hard to put it in words. You just see them light up and get this giddy look on their face. It’s really magical,” he said.

A new addition to his collection is an antique sleigh he found advertised on Facebook. “I woke up early one Saturday and drove to Michigan in my friend’s truck to bring it back. My wife was up by the time I got back, and she asked where I was. I told her I took a drive,” he said. He has used the sleigh at his antique store and is now working to put wheels on it so it can be used in parades. And make no mistake who’s in the van when you see license plates that spell out Santa.

He's also getting better at being able to think quickly—a special trait very necessary for Santa when visiting with inquisitive children. “Children will try to see if you’re the real Santa by asking lots of questions. One is “What’s the name of my Elf on the Shelf?’ I’ll say an elfin name and they’ll say that’s not it. But then I explain that the name I’ve said is his real name at the North Pole. There’s the fear of not being able to think on your feet because you know they’re going to question you and those are the ones who are close to not believing anymore,” he said.

Joe says he still believed in Santa a few years past the usual age when children no longer believe. “Most kids by six or seven start questioning, but I want to say I was 10 or 11, which was amazing because there were eight of us in my family. You would assume one of my older brothers or sisters would have told me, but no, they kept it going.”

The passion and the magic are all still very real for Joe, who was born just five days before Christmas.

“Santa’s not fictional. He is in your heart, really. And he represents Christmas. Not from the gift side, but from the kindness side,” Joe said. “I’ve always loved Christmas. People are different. Take the stress of shopping away—there are a lot of celebrations and people just seem to be their best during Christmas.”

Learn more about Santa Joe on his website.