The Day I Met Nate Eli, Became Santa, and Fell Even More in Love With My Hometown

Before we get started, let me confess something:
As a child, I was that kid… the one who SCREAMED when presented with Santa.
I mean full-body, red-faced, “Dear Lord, why are you handing me to this giant bearded man?” panic.

And honestly? Valid.
Santa, when you're tiny, has a slightly “run for your life” vibe.

But I grew up.
I adapted.
I stopped screaming (in public).
And Christmas in my hometown of Lufkin, Texas became this beautiful mix of magic, mischief, and stories I couldn’t make up if I tried.

This one is my favorite.

The Year the KYKX Christmas Gnome and a Cabbage Patch Kid Changed Everything

Picture the 80s:
Big hair.
Bigger shoulder pads.
Cabbage Patch Kids sweeping the nation like a fever dream.

And to this day I still think Cabbage Patch Kids are… well… homely.
Bless their little yarn hearts.
But they came with a birth certificate and a name, and for some reason the world lost its mind.

Our town had a morning radio show that announced a contest:

Find the KYKX Christmas Gnome and win a Cabbage Patch Kid.

Sounds magical, right?
Except he wasn’t a gnome.
He wasn’t dressed up.
He wasn’t festive.
He was literally just…
a man.
In jeans.
Carrying a brown paper lunch sack.
Walking around town like a normal citizen.

Meanwhile, my daily life was peak small-town charm:
– I’d go to high school during the day
– Then in the evenings, I wrapped Christmas gifts at Clark’s Department Store
– AND at Thompson’s Drug Store
Let that sink in: a drug store that wrapped gifts.
Not only that — Thompson’s had the best hamburgers in town.
You could get your prescription, your wrapping paper, and your dinner all in one place. Simpler times.

Between gift-wrapping shifts and mall trips, I was memorizing the McDonald's Big Mac jingle and “Rapper’s Delight,” so approaching strangers with weird questions didn’t faze me one bit.

And of course, December meant the Lufkin oil rig Rudolph was out — the highlight of our small-town skyline.
There was no better symbol of Christmas than a 30-foot metal reindeer built out of industrial equipment. Iconic.

Now enter: The Mall.
Our social hub.
Our runway.
Our Friday night everything.

And that’s where it happened.

One afternoon I’m cruising through the Lufkin Mall, minding my business, probably wearing something with more hairspray than fabric… and I see him.
Jeans.
Brown paper sack.
Looking suspiciously normal.

My heart said, That’s him.

I walked up and asked the magic question:
“Are you the KYKX Christmas Gnome?”

He looked at me and said, “Yes.”

And friends — I WON.
I was practically crowned Miss Christmas Lufkin 1980-something.

My prize:
A Cabbage Patch Kid named Nate Eli.
He had red yarn hair that smelled like… well… red yarn mixed with 80s plastic fumes.
But I loved him for an entire day.

Then my mom gently — lovingly — strategically suggested that I give Nate Eli to my younger sister, who wanted one desperately for Christmas.

So I wrapped him up (professionally, of course, because at this point I was basically a certified holiday gift-wrapping ninja).
I tucked him under the tree.
And that year, without even realizing it…

I got to be Santa.
Quietly.
Secretly.
Joyfully.
Unwrapping the magic from one pair of hands… and placing it into another.

And that’s when it hit me — in a town where oil rigs turned into reindeer, drug stores wrapped gifts, and the mall was our kingdom…

Christmas magic wasn’t fragile.
It didn’t vanish when the truth came out.
It just changed shape.
It grew up with me.
It moved into my own hands.

YOUR TURN

What about you?
When did you get to be Santa?
When did you get to make someone’s wish come true without them ever knowing it was you?

Share your story — funny, sweet, chaotic, heartfelt — because that’s the real magic of Christmas.
And sometimes that magic smells like red yarn hair and hamburgers from Thompson’s.