Aliens and Santa

On Sunday afternoon, I found myself in Orange County, book in hand, laying on a blanket, watching a church soccer game. Nearby a 5 year old and 8 year old were impatiently waiting for their parent's game to end so they could go home and get warm. It was overcast and I was cold as well.
After a couple minutes of attempting to read 'The Weight of Glory', I invited them over to the blanket to hang out. We played paper, rock, scissors and the hand slap game. Then we played duck, duck, goose... the game just isn't fun with 3 people. After about 10 minutes of being the goose, little Eden (the 5 year old girl) suggested that we switch games and play 100 Questions. JT (the 8 year old boy) joyfully agreed. It seems that this is an expanded form of 20 questions, minus the pressure.
Eden started the game. A person... kind of, dead... no alive, poor... no rich. I thought, "This is going to be such a long soccer game." Finally JT asked, "Is he brown?" A nod from Eden. "Jesus!". Wow, I should have known...
JT was next. About 15 questions into the game, he could see the frustration from Eden and I, so he offered, "He's imaginary.. he's not real." Without thinking I blurted out "SANTA!" I was so proud of myself, I got it! Their reactions were raised eyebrows, with their big brown eyes staring back at me. Confusion, utter confusion.
I backpedaled, I said "Just kidding", I laughed, and then said "Leprechauns?" They had never heard of them before. I filtered out the tooth fairy and the Easter bunny to avoid any further damage.
Finally, JT just shrugged his shoulders and said, "It was an alien".
As a peace offering and to get their minds off of Santa, I offered them each a piece of sugarless gum. As we chomped away at our minty gum, Eden gave me princess stickers and JT showed me his slinky crazy eyes glasses. I wonder what the conversation that night at dinner looked like?