Pure Sole: I Am Not Santa

The sunrise creeps over Stephens Passage and Admiralty Island to welcome in the New Year through Gastineau Channel on Thursday, Jan. 1, 2026. (Klas Stolpe / Juneau Independent)

Klas Stolpe

Juneau Independent

So I am not Santa.

At least AI says so.

I took a lazy approach to trying to find where I had misplaced a holiday story from waaaaaay back in my Petersburg days detailing how I had discovered the “Santa” visiting us Little Norway youth at the annual Moose Club shindig was actually my Moose Club-member father Harold. So I googled “Santa Klas Stolpe.”

And those wonderful Artificial Intelligence gurus replied:

“‘Santa Klas Stolpe’ likely refers to Klas Stolpe, a writer/photographer/ultrarunner from Juneau, Alaska, who sometimes writes about local events (like the Juneau Independent's Holiday Cup), but the ‘Santa’ part comes from a local newspaper caption associating him with Christmas spirit or a festive mindset, not that he is Santa. There are no traditional ‘Klas Stolpe’ Santa figures; it's a local media reference to his enthusiastic, festive, or perhaps humorous Christmas-themed commentary.”

Not sure if I am happy or sad about that.

Christmas spirit? Festive mindset? I kind of have a genetic depressive association and a seasonal malaise so if I appear “jolly,” one might wonder if I have an unfinished manifesto just to the right of my laptop.

But NO Klas Stolpe Santa figures? I don’t know. I am currently selling them by the box load out of my vehicle - which has four wonderful Blizzak tires and all-wheel drive!!!! (Brief aside here: C’mon, folks. I have been shoveling people out of harsh driving conditions for too many seasons now…Don’t go out if your vehicle has bald, non-winter tires and goes forward only if pushed on the downhill and especially if the city suggests you do not — not even if, “I wanted to get a drive-thru coffee…I wanted to get grandma’s favorite snacks…I want to watch a snow plow…because, dagnabit, city can’t tell me what to do.”

And yes, could there possibly be some mixed messages on where to go, what is open, what is not, what will be reimbursed and what will not for services not rendered, who has been good and who bad? And why are we using a mixture on our roads that cannot be scooped up with snow and dropped in the waters that surround us? Does that mixture disappear when winter mellows or rain occurs? Are there sub-contracted folks in the storm drains with buckets who catch all the runoff and then resell it overseas in exchange for reduced tariffs?

See, now you got Santa Klas checking on a few things.

So how do you like my enthusiastic, festive and humorous Christmas-themed commentary so far?

I do have a good friend that calls me “Santa Klas.”

He has from our first encounter. It was in winter, around Christmas, but did not involve flying deer, jingle jangle bells or “ho, ho, ho.”

He and I actually grew up in a reality of sworn enemies. I was a southeastern Petersburg Viking and he part of the Sitka Wolves and we exchanged elbows through high school graduation and good natured-barbs since.

He is now a member of a clandestine network of powerful individuals that control or influence world affairs and governments. No, not the Illuminati…the “Referati” — the bearers of stripes and whistles. And I am the conspiracy documentarian of every good or bad call.

Wait a minute…I AM checking a naughty and nice situation. Do you think maybe I really could be a fictional character from Scandinavian folklore, refined and polished over the seasons into multiple, good black-and-white holiday movies and many recently bad colorized theatrical budget breakers?

I had to ask my old friend about all this. We wound up “railing” on about how hard he and I had it back in the day, as opposed to today’s youth. We seemed so much like the two old men from the Muppet Show grousing about everything that I had to look over my shoulder and make sure no puppeteer had their hand up our, err, shirts (?).

He did bring up some good points.

I do like a good belly laugh.

Red was my favorite color growing up (until three mean girls would make fun of me and I would turn a bright shade of that color in embarrassment).

I like pets (I just can’t have one in my current abode, even if it flies).

I think this place is the North Pole sometimes…just look outside.

I like cookies (but I have switched to oat milk).

I have a twinkle in my eye (might be the start of cataracts, but it is there).

I shake like a bowlful of jelly (look, have you seen my dance moves?).

I am swift enough to get around to multiple houses in a holiday visit (yes, I am thinner now with a health “clause” that has influenced some better eating habits).

Look, even Santa ages. Things can take a wear and tear, both mentally and physically, as online sales have hampered staff and physical product is being mass produced elsewhere and folks are not believing in what is actually under their tree in the morning, but rather what they are told is in that packaging.

But I am not Santa.

Google AI said so.

• Contact Klas Stolpe at klas.stolpe@gmail.com.