{"id":245609,"date":"2012-12-07T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-12-07T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdnews.com\/santa-swank-is-coming-to-town-2\/"},"modified":"2012-12-07T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-12-07T08:00:00","slug":"santa-swank-is-coming-to-town-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/santa-swank-is-coming-to-town-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Santa Swank is coming to town"},"content":{"rendered":"

Por Morgan M. Hurley | Asistente de edici\u00f3n SDUN<\/strong><\/p>\n

The official Balboa Park December Nights Santa will be the first to tell you he is not your typical mall Santa. But once you meet him, that fact is obvious. Not only does he not need to hang a fake white beard over his ears, or stuff two pillows under his shirt, he is one of the jolliest fellows you will ever meet.<\/p>\n

\"Santa
Bill Swank as Santa, surrounded by children from the Jackie Robinson YMCA (Photo by Morgan M. Hurley)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In fact, he exudes jolly.<\/p>\n

Bill Swank wears a lot of hats besides the cap of good old St. Nicholas, but being Santa Claus in Balboa Park three nights out of the year makes him happier than a child on Christmas morning.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the last thing I ever thought I\u2019d do,\u201d Swank said.<\/p>\n

Over the years he had been approached by people, other professional Santas and companies asking him if he would like to make money by putting on that big red suit. He always turned them down. Then one year, he was filling up his plate at Hometown Buffet when he felt something around his leg.<\/p>\n

He moved his tray and peered over his midsection. \u201cIt was a little Mexican girl, really tiny, and she had both arms wrapped around my leg and she said, \u2018I love you Santa,\u2019\u201d Swank said. \u201cI patted her on the head and said, \u2018I love you, too, honey.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

A year later, when he was approached about working as Santa for the Community Christmas Center, the organization that runs December Nights, he remembered that little girl. \u201cIt\u2019s one thing for adults to tell you to be Santa,\u201d he said, \u201cbut when a kid sees you and they have that reaction, it\u2019s meant to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eleven years later, this retired probation officer is still having a blast.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s interacting with the kids and their families,\u201d Swank said, standing in the middle of the Balboa Park Organ Pavilion. He seemed to get a little choked up over this revelation. \u201cI\u2019ve never had my beard pulled. Little babies put their fingers in it, but that\u2019s not intentional.\u201d<\/p>\n

His annual gig started with the lighting of the Christmas Tree at the Organ Pavilion, this year on Saturday, Dec. 1. While he sat with children for a short while after lighting the tree, it is the following weekend\u2019s December Nights celebration \u2013 Friday, Dec. 7 and Saturday, Dec. 8 \u2013 where he really puts the hours in, looking forward to every minute.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not a mall Santa,\u201d Swank said. \u201cI\u2019m not sure how they work [today], but when I would take my kids to the malls when they were kids, there wasn\u2019t too much interaction. I don\u2019t want to disparage other Santas, but I talk with the kids and I make a point of talking with every kid. I try to have fun with them and laugh. The lines move slow but I think the people enjoy [it].\u201d<\/p>\n

And by all accounts they do. The lines to sit on Santa\u2019s lap wrap all the way around the pavilion for December Nights, and many children come back year after year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t have any Santa training,\u201d Swank said. \u201cI knew that kids would be shy and some would be afraid of Santa. If I\u2019m told that, I back off, but otherwise, I have fun and I\u2019m a loud Santa.\u201d<\/p>\n

Swank said each year he picks a couple of shy ones out of the crowd, pointing to them and saying, \u201cHey, there you are! You came! I\u2019ve been waiting for you!\u201d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Morgan M. Hurley | SDUN Assistant Editor The official Balboa Park December Nights Santa will be the first to tell you he is not your typical mall Santa. But once you meet him, that fact is obvious. Not only does he not need to hang a fake white beard over his ears, or stuff […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":753,"featured_media":245610,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11555","_seopress_titles_title":"Santa Swank is coming to town","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11549,11547,11551,11555],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-245609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-entertainment","category-features","category-news","category-uptown-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/753"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}