What if We Believed

Every year my little girl sits on the lap of a stranger with an overgrown beard and an overfed belly and smiles.
She smiles a pure, nonjudgmental, unsolicited, straight-from-the-soul smile. She’s done it since birth.
And this isn’t about the bragging rights of tears versus cheers when it comes to the Big Guy. It’s about the fact that before my daughter could even comprehend there was something to be gained—that this man would give her a candy cane just to cop a squat on his knee—she believed. She trusted. There was an unfiltered acceptance there. A knowing that if her mother handed her over to someone unknown, all shall be okay.
Now, this has become a real area of concern in regard to stranger danger with her, but what a blessing it must be to see the world as my daughter does. Because that’s certainly not my first instinct.
My cup isn’t running over …