The California pipevine swallowtail butterfly is a wonder to behold.

It begins its life as a tiny red egg, hatches into an enormous orange-speckled caterpillar, and then — after a gestation period of up to two years — emerges as an iridescent blue beauty. Brimming with oceanic tones, the creature’s wings are considered by collectors to be some of the most magnificent in North America.

For centuries, the California pipevine swallowtail — or, Battus philenor hirsuta — called San Francisco home. As development increased in the early 20th century, the butterfly slowly began to disappear. Today it is a rare sight.

But one man’s DIY efforts are starting to bring the butterfly back.

His story reminds us that we can all contribute to conservation efforts — sometimes even from our own backyards.

The butterfly whisperer

As an aquatic biologist at the California Academy of Sciences, Tim Wong rarely has a dull day.

Whether he’s hanging out with an albino alligator, swimming with Javanese stingrays, or treating a hungry octopus to a hamster ball full of shrimp, Wong is constantly caring for one of the science museum’s 38,000 animals.

But outside of work, the 28-year-old devotes the bulk of his free time to raising butterflies, a hobby he picked up as a kid.

“I first was inspired to raise butterflies when I was in elementary school,” Wong says. “We raised painted lady butterflies in the classroom, and I was amazed at the complete metamorphosis from caterpillar to adult.”

In an open meadow near his home, Wong spent his days catching, studying, and raising any butterflies he could find.

Years later, he learned about the pipevine swallowtail — which had become increasingly rare in San Francisco — and he made it his personal mission to bring the butterfly back.

California pipevine swallowtail butterflies typically lay their eggs in “clutches” of five to 30.

He researched the butterfly and learned that when in caterpillar form, it only feeds on one plant: the California pipevine (Aristolochia californica), an equivalently rare flora in the city.

“Finally, I was able to find this plant in the San Francisco Botanical Garden [in Golden Gate Park],” Wong says. “And they allowed me to take a few clippings of the plant.”

Then in his own backyard, using self-taught techniques, he created a butterfly paradise.

“[I built] a large screen enclosure to protect the butterflies and to allow them to mate under outdoor environmental conditions — natural sun, airflow, temp fluctuations,” he says.

“The specialized enclosure protects the butterflies from some predators, increases mating opportunities, and serves as a study environment to better understand the criteria female butterflies are looking for in their ideal host plant.”

Tim Wong’s backyard butterfly enclosure includes the California pipevine plant, along with other native flora, to make the butterflies feel at home.

Though the California pipevine butterfly had nearly disappeared in San Francisco, it was still common outside the city, in places with more vegetation. With permission, Wong was able to source an initial group of 20 caterpillars from private residences.

He carefully transported them to his backyard and set them loose on the plants to feed.

“They feed as a little army,” he says. “They roam around the pipevine plant from leaf to leaf, munching on it as a group.”

Top: early-stage pipevine caterpillars; bottom: a handful of late-growth-stage caterpillars.

Once situated, the caterpillars began their long, drawn-out process of maturation.

After about 3-4 weeks, a caterpillar pupates and forms a chrysalis (or outer shell). The insect liquifies itself inside, and either develops into a into butterfly in about two weeks, or stays dormant for up to two years (this delayed development is called “diapause“).

“It’s like a long hibernation,” says Wong. “And when it’s over, they emerge as adult butterflies.”

Typically the adult pipevine butterfly hatches from its chrysalis in spring, but it can be seen flying from February to October. Depending on temperature, predation, and food availability, the butterflies live for two to five weeks.

During this time, the females lay tiny red eggs on the pipevine plants. Wong carefully collects these and incubates them indoors, away from natural predators like spiders and earwigs.

“From there,” he says, “the cycle continues.”

Various stage of pipevine swallowtail growth (from bottom: eggs, different growth stages of the caterpillar, chrysalis, full butterfly).

When the eggs hatch and a new cycle of life begins, Wong raises the caterpillars at home, then brings them back to the San Francisco Botanical Garden’s “California Native” exhibit.

A DIY conservation effort

While other conservationists have succeeded in repopulating the pipevine butterfly in the neighboring counties of Santa Cruz and Sonoma, none have been successful in San Francisco. In the late 1980s, a woman named Barbara Deutsch had attempted to reintroduce the species with 500 caterpillars, but the butterflies vanished after a few years.

When Wong first started bringing caterpillars to the botanical garden, he’d only transport a few hundred at a time. But as his backyard caterpillar population grew, he was able to exponentially increase this. Last year he introduced “thousands” of caterpillars to the garden.

Caterpillars pupate into chrysalises, remaining in this state for up to several years before emerging as butterflies. While inside, their bodies liquefy and reform as completely new creatures.

Wong attributes his success largely to the favorable habitat he’s created for the caterpillars. In the past few years, he’s cultivated more than 200 California pipevine plants. Through extensive weeding, and the planting of additional nectar plants, Wong has been able to reintroduce the butterfly to San Francisco for the first time in decades.

“Each year since 2012, we’ve seen more butterflies surviving in the garden, flying around, laying eggs, successfully pupating, and emerge the following year,” he says. “That’s a good sign that our efforts are working!”

“For most people, it’s the dream butterfly to work with in the region. It’s gorgeous. If most people saw it in SF, they wouldn’t think it’s a native butterfly.” —Tim Wong

While Wong has had success raising native butterflies at home, he cautions that it “isn’t for everyone.” A DIY conservation effort requires a special understanding of each species’ natural history, a natural sensibility, and a lot of tedious work.

But there are much simpler ways to contribute. The flourishing of local species is largely driven by restoring native habitats. Planting native flora host plants is an effective way to boost endemic butterfly populations. Weeding (to allow easier access to food sources) and avoiding pesticides is equally beneficial.

“Improving habitat for native fauna is something anyone can do,” Wong says. “Conservation and stewardship can start in your very own backyard.”

Save the salamanders, unsung heroes of the forest

One day before Betsy DeVos’s controversial appointment as the nation’s secretary of education, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee made a historic announcement: Starting next fall, community college will be free to all California residents who’ve lived in the city for at least one year.

“At a time when the political rhetoric is punishing those who are less fortunate, San Francisco has again united around our values and taken the national lead on this important issue of equality,” Lee said on Monday.

The initiative, spearheaded by city supervisor Jane Kim, makes San Francisco the first major city in America to offer free college to the entirety of its population.

The initiative will be funded by a tax on $5 million-plus homes

Last November, San Francisco voters approved Proposition W, which levied a transfer tax on all properties selling for $5 million or more. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the measure is expected to raise $44 million annually.

The new initiative will dole out $2.1 million of this revenue annually to students wishing to enroll at San Francisco City College. At the college’s current rate of $46 per credit, this will buy 45,000 academic credits — enough to fully fund 3,750 full-time students per year. Additionally, students who already receive free tuition will be getting an extra $500 per year for textbooks and supplies.

In December, New York State Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced a $163 million plan to “provide free tuition to residents whose families earn less than $125,000 per year.” Unlike Cuomo’s proposal, San Francisco’s initiative is open to all residents, regardless of income — “Even the children of the founders of Facebook,” said city supervisor Jane Kim.

An attempt to reverse the city’s income gap

The City College of San Francisco has struggled for several years. Since 2012, enrollment has fallen from 90,000 to 65,000 full- and part-time students, and the school nearly lost its accreditation in the wake of fiscal planning issues.

Administrators hope the new free tuition plan will reinvigorate the school and boost enrollment by as much as 20 percent.

But the initiative aims to combat a much bigger issue: income inequality.

Kim, who put the initiative into motion, ran a campaign for Senate last year largely centered on the issue of student debt, which collectively amounts to $1 trillion nationally.

She hopes that in San Francisco — a city with one of the highest income gaps in America — free education will help reduce the burden of debt and mitigate inequality by funding it with a tax on multimillion-dollar homes.

“We as politicians, as policymakers, are responsible for at least trying to reverse [these] trends,” she said in a news conference. “And one of the best ways we can do that is investing in our citizens.”

Among thousands of people ambling toward the US Capitol on Friday, Dallas Horton shares an admission: He is, he says in a quiet voice, one of the key “architects” of Donald Trump’s election.

He wasn’t a Trump staffer, Horton clarifies, and he never worked in politics. He has only met Trump once. But Horton says that at a campaign event in Colorado this October, he told Trump that the Republican nominee needed to soften his rhetoric on immigration to beat Hillary Clinton — and lo and behold, two weeks later Trump said he’d only deport “criminals,” implying that other undocumented immigrants would be allowed to stay.

“I know he gets lots of advice from lots of people, but I think he really listened to me because I told it to him straight,” says Horton, 63, who has a white “Trump-Pence” sticker taped to his beige cowboy hat. “And I think that’s a big part of the reason he won the election.”

Horton is a cattle rancher in western Colorado, and says President Obama’s decision to designate new national parkland in his state — thus sealing it off from private enterprise — has cost him tens thousands of dollars. He’s friendly and talkative, emphasizing his hopes for “national unity” and how Trump will help all Americans — not just the ones who voted for him.

“I know now how the early settlers of America felt after they won the Revolutionary War,” Horton says, teary-eyed. “I really believe what he says. He’s going to Make America Great Again — for everyone.”

Don’t lose sight of the “average” Trump voter

Since the Trump phenomenon began on that escalator all those months ago, news reporters have often focused on the most outrageous and fanatical members of Trump’s base: the avowed white supremacists who endorsed his candidacy, the Pizzagate conspiracists, the alt-right fanatics at the “Deploraball.”

In reality, Trump’s election was not powered by an alienated fringe of internet trolls, but rather by a majority of America’s predominant ethnic group. As Vox’s Brian Resnick and Sarah Frostenson detailed right after the election, close to 60 percent of US white people — about 62 million of them — voted for Trump.

It was an overwhelmingly white crowd that turned out in Washington on Friday to celebrate Trump’s inauguration — and an overwhelmingly polite one.

These attendees did not grab the headlines amid the chaos, bullhorns, chanting, and fanfare. But they were most representative of the group that brought Trump to power.

Polite white people are central to Trumpism

Almost none of the Trump supporters attending the inauguration who spoke with Vox knew anything about “Pepe” or the “alt-right.” By and large, they talked in simple, optimistic terms about their soon-to-be-sworn-in champion.

Waiting in line to access the inauguration, husband and wife Ken and Kristen Fritschel, who hail from Jackson Hole, Wyoming, say they’ve never heard of the alt-right, and they don’t mind peaceful protests. They are, they say, excited to take in the sights of DC and see some of the national monuments.

“I think Trump surrounded himself with people who are very level-headed,” says Ken Fritschel, a consultant. “I’m just optimistic because he promised to make government more efficient again and create a business climate that helps us.”

On H Street, Northwest, still in line for the inauguration, George McCall, an executive at a community bank, and three friends from western Virginia — including a dentist and a real estate executive — express similar sentiments.

“We felt it was important to make this pilgrimage,” McCall says. “Anyone who has been paying attention knows he’s going to Make America Great Again by ‘draining the swamp.’”

A little ahead in the line, David DiPietro, a local assemblyman from Aurora, New York, brushes off questions about Trump’s demeanor. “The ‘alt-right,’ the ‘alt-left’ — all that stuff is way overblown,” he says. “I don’t consider myself a Republican. Forget that label. He’s an American, and the people love him. Just look at this.”

Ken and Deborah Heath, two Trump supporters waiting in line with matching ponchos, watch a parade of protesters march down the street. Deborah shakes her head.

“We don’t get into all that,” she says. “I think what they’re saying is ridiculous, but we respect their right to free speech and to protest if they want. They can shout and do all they want to do.”

Greg Jones, adorned in a Confederate flag cowboy hat and American flag boots, says he was swayed by Trump’s promise to restore manufacturing jobs. After watching Trump get inaugurated, he hangs around at Union Station, hoping to strike up friendly debates with protesters.

“They see my hat and tell me to go to hell,” he says. “Just come talk to me. Give me a damn chance. You’ll see I’m a nice guy, capable of engaging in a conversation.”

Jones, from Daytona Beach, Florida, came to DC for the first time in his life to support Trump. “I used to work on trains as a factory worker,” he says, leaning up against a railing. “I’m a simple guy. I have a family to feed.”

As hundreds of protesters marched by the seating area of the train, Jones said he’d been trying to talk with someone the whole time. Nobody had stopped for more than 30 seconds.

But for the millions of Americans not attending either event, the protests have seemed to garner much more interest.

According to data provided to Vox by Google, searches for “protest inauguration” have far outranked searches for “attend inauguration” this week:

Comparing this map with the results of the 2016 election presents a stark difference.

In total, 13 states that voted for Trump in November — some deep red states — searched far more for “protest inauguration” this week than for “attend inauguration”: Arizona, Arkansas, Alaska, Michigan, Montana, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, and Wisconsin.

Of course, search data only tells us so much. We should be clear that this is only indicative of what Americans in these states have been most frequently searching for this week. It is not indicative of whether they are interested in joining or supporting protests, or just reading about them.

Still, it is interesting that the majority of people in these 13 Trump-voting states seem more concerned with protests than with the ceremony of the man they elected.

In any case, all the controversy surrounding both events has been good for Washington’s tourism industry: Data that Google sent Vox shows that search interest in DC hotels is 60 percent higher this week than in the week leading up to Obama’s 2013 inauguration — and interest in flights is up 160 percent.

Watch: What makes a good inaugural address?

The 10 largest of these all surpassed $200 million apiece:

Two of the three most generous donations came from Nike co-founder Phil Knight — both bequeathed to higher education institutions. His $500 million gift to Oregon University, to be used to create a scientific research center, marks the largest single donation to a public university in American history. An additional $400 million donation to Stanford University will be used to establish a scholars program for global leadership.

Investor Nicolas Berggruen’s $400 million donation will be used to create his own public policy think tank, the Berggruen Institute.

Calculating these donations as a percentage of the donor’s net worth, though, the most generous gesture was a $400 million gift from Howard and Lottie Marcus. Their gift represented their entire life savings.

The since-deceased elderly couple, who had fled Nazi Germany and invested with Warren Buffett in the 1960s, gave the funds to Israel’s Ben-Gurion University for water research. “The single biggest gift before this was $20 million,” a university official told Jewish Week.

Also among the biggest single donations of 2016 was a pair of $300 million-plus gifts from Michael Bloomberg, benefiting anti-tobacco research and the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Hedge fund manager Steven Cohen gave $275 million to start the Cohen Veterans Network (a mental health institute for former military service members), Facebook co-founder Sean Parker threw down $250 million to start the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, and Oracle founder Larry Ellison pledged $200 million to the University of Southern California to establish a medical clinic bearing his name.

These donations — collectively totaling more than $3 billion — benefited a wide array of causes:

Here are a few other massive donations from individuals in 2016 that narrowly missed this list (full breakdown at Forbes):

• Sanford Weill (Citigroup chair emeritus): $185 million to the University of California San Francisco, for neuroscience research
• Sheryl Sandberg (Facebook COO): $107.2 million to Fidelity Charitable
• Paul Allen (Microsoft co-founder): $100 million to the Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group
• David Geffen (DreamWorks co-founder): $100 million to New York’s Museum of Modern Art for renovations and expansion
• Reed Hastings (Netflix founder): $100 million to the Silicon Valley Community Foundation

It is possible there were other non-public, or anonymous, donations that exceeded $100 million. But this report gives us an idea of what institutions America’s wealthiest benefactors are supporting.

Explore more of 2016’s top donations in the Chronicle of Philanthropy’s full report.

Visit any Ikea, and you’ll see hordes of 20-somethings milling through a vast maze of bed frames, bookshelves, tables, and lamps.

More than 771 million people visit the home furnishing company’s 375 retail locations (40 of which are in the US) each year. Collectively, these stores generate an annual revenue of $34.5 billion USD and use 530 million cubic feet of wood to manufacture their ready-to-build offerings. A supposed ease of construction, modern design, and relative affordability have made Ikea a furniture mecca for young college grads.

But as tastes mature, consumers tend to abandon Ikea for classier or more home improvement-focused retailers.

The credit and financing company Earnest recently analyzed a dataset of more than 10,000 American shoppers’ spending habits to address a pertinent question: When do consumers ditch Ikea?

The answer: at approximately the age of 34.

According to the data, the prime Ikea years —what Earnest calls the “Ikea decade” — run from the mid-20s to the early 30s, with 24 years old as the absolute peak (31 percent shop there). At around 34 — the national average home buying age — shoppers begin to abandon Ikea.

Let’s take a look at where they go.

From Ikea to Lowe’s: where we buy home furnishings over our lifetime

As the halcyon days of Ikea fade away in the mid-30s, consumers gravitate toward a slew of other retailers — some fancier, others just more practical for home improvement purposes.

Earnest combed its data for spending habits at the largest 14 furniture retailers in America and determined the age at which most respondents reported shopping at each store. Below, we’ve mapped out the average consumer’s progression over time.

With a peak customer age of 24, Ikea’s customers are the only contingent that falls under 30 here.

As consumers age into their early 30s, they move toward housewares and home accessory stores like Bed Bath & Beyond, Crate & Barrel, Williams-Sonoma, and the Container Store.

This isn’t, of course, an indication that they outgrow Ikea: It could be the case that most young adults purchase their essential furniture items (bed frames, couches, chairs, etc.) when they have their first apartment, then cling to them throughout their 30s, turning their focus to the plethora of smaller home necessities, like nicer sheets, curtains, and dinner sets.

Older customers (those in their late 40s to mid-50s) seem to prefer home improvement stores like Home Depot and Lowe’s. When these folks do buy furniture, they favor big-box retailers like Ashley Furniture over the build-it-yourself wares of Ikea.

For this author, assembling one Ikea bookcase is more than enough for a lifetime.

Brian Marchetti has arrived at Chick-fil-A, and the first thing he must do is park where nobody will see him.

Over the past month, the 50-year-old Baltimorean has undergone a fantastic transformation. His beard, typically short and brownish-gray, is now 7 inches long and white as snow; his business attire has been swapped for a red, fur-lined suit and black boots; small reading glasses perch on the bridge of his nose.

A safe distance from the crowd, he steps out of his minivan and slides open the side door, revealing an array of props: Christmas books, music boxes, wooden toys, six red satin sacks, an array of 60 hats, a faux mailbox, elf costumes. Tonight’s gig — one of about 110 that Marchetti will work this holiday season — is a simple meet-and-greet, and won’t be requiring any of the bells and whistles.

Marchetti bursts into the restaurant with Pavarottian bravado, his arms outstretched above his red cap — and in an instant, he is besieged by children, iPhone flashes, and starry-eyed adults hungry for the ether of youth.

This is life as a professional Santa Claus: a complete physical and mental metamorphosis, rates as high as $350 an hour, and a taste of being the most beloved person in a room of 150 kids. But donning the suit comes with tremendous social responsibility — and every now and then, a little pee.

The professional Santa Claus business

Marchetti is one of thousands of men from all around the United States who make a living as a professional Santa Claus around the holiday season.

It is an odd troupe, consisting largely of overweight retirees in their 50s or 60s, most of whom sport a luscious beard and embrace the jovial spirit of the character year-round. They gather on internet forums like ClausNet and discuss topics like how to answer difficult questions from children (i.e., “Why does Santa have to be obese?”), or how to build a birchwood sleigh that can support 250 pounds. They are ex-police officers, attorneys, professors, and construction foremen — but their past lives are of little importance once they don the red suit.

There are those Santas who vie for mall gigs each season, which tend to pay between $6,000 and $15,000 for 40 consecutive days of six-hour shifts. And then there are those like Marchetti, who willingly choose to act as independent businessmen, working the secondary circuit of corporate events, home visits, office parties, and restaurant meet-and-greets.

These Santas market themselves on online booking platforms, extolling virtues like “best real beard West of the Mississippi” and “jolly, fat, and ready for action.” They charge anywhere from $100 to $350 an hour, and during the prime season — generally from the day after Thanksgiving to early January — can earn upward of $20,000.

According to data from booking site GigSalad, there are more than 1,200 professional Santas in operation, and they are distributed pretty evenly throughout the country.

Marchetti, one of at least 16 Santas in Maryland, worked 85 gigs over 40 days last year. This year, demand went up: He estimates he’ll finish the season with around 110.

His jobs range in scope from parties at all-adult karaoke bars, to appearances at fast food restaurants, to private home visits in wealthy suburban enclaves. The day I talked to him, he’d already worked two events by 6:30 pm, and was sitting in a parking lot waiting for his third to begin.

“There’s a lot of waiting around between jobs,” he says. “But if I have a four-hour period free and I’m in the suit, I’ll go brighten someone’s day for free. Every Christmas morning, I work a homeless shelter and pass out gifts. There is always volunteer work.”

Based in Eastern Baltimore — a primarily blue-collar, economically depressed area where there isn’t much disposable income going around — Marchetti often travels several hours to DC or Virginia for paying gigs.

He cites a noticeable difference between how children in poor areas and those in upscale areas react to his services. “When you’re in an environment that’s economically depressed, children seem to not be as communicative, not as reactive, and not as comfortable,” he says. “They have lower expectations.”

So, he must do his best to be as convincing as possible.

Becoming Santa

Brian Marchetti’s second life began five years ago, when a friend asked him to dress as Santa for her children on Christmas Eve. “After that,” he says, “I realized I’d found my calling.”

Aesthetically, Marchetti fits the bill. He’s a big guy with bright blue eyes, and has had the ability to grow a thick beard since he was in high school. After 20 years as a car dealership owner and part-time volunteer at a child sexual abuse nonprofit, he’s developed a gentile rapport with people.

The first order of business any Santa faces, says Marchetti, is finding a good suit.

A Santa outfit can be had for around $100 off the shelf of a Party City superstore. But to play the role convincingly — well enough for people to pay you —  requires something a bit more exceptional. Marchetti’s, acquired through a friend, is custom-made and worth an estimated $1,200. With the boots, hat, sash, and gloves, his whole rig clocks in at 39.6 pounds.

Beard management is also crucial: Every year, Marchetti endures a multi-day bleaching process to make it pure white.

“This year, I spent about 25 hours in the salon,” he says. “I’ve been back to the salon twice, and I’ll probably go back at the end of this week to get touched up.” The first time he ever had the process done, the chemical burn from the bleaching paste left his cheeks bleeding for four days.

But appearance is only a small component of what makes a great Santa. The real magic is manifested through body language, disposition, and a keen ability to read people.

What it takes to be a phenomenal Santa

Ed Taylor (Santa Ed), a semi-retired professional speaker and marketer, got his start seven years ago as a volunteer Santa in Ashland, Oregon. Today, he is one of the most successful Santas in the business. His gigs this year have included the cast party for the Ellen DeGeneres Show, private events with the Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Rams, and company parties at Facebook and Pinterest. On his website, he reports earnings in excess of $100,000 per year.

Taylor pivoted his success into an online school — the Santa Claus Conservatory —  where he charges Santas-in-training $197 for a series of courses covering such topics as “Santa for children with special needs” and “How to video chat.” So far, 900 Santas have signed up.

In his program, Taylor offers several tips for being an exceptional Santa.

For starters, one needs to master the ‘Ho, Ho, Ho!’ — Santa’s signature bird call. “A lot of Santas are too staccato,” he says. “You’ve got to relax into it, and just let it be a part of your laugh.” Voice dynamics, in general, are of the utmost importance: One needs to be grand and bold when entering the room, but soft and gentle when in close proximity to children.

It is crucial for a Santa to be well-versed in both storytelling and Santa mythology. That means memorizing not only Christmas carols and poems, but the lore of the character: what the North Pole is like, how he hires elves, what he feeds the reindeer.

Body language, hand gestures in particular, are also a sensitive issue. “There’s also often an awkwardness with what we do with our hands,” says Taylor. “A Santa should flail his hands around during a grand entry, but be a bit gentler when sitting with a child.”

Marchetti know this struggle well. “We Santas have to be very careful about how we handle children,” he says. “The last thing I would never want a child to say to their parent is, ‘I don’t like the way Santa touched me.’”

“Parents raise their children to not interact with strangers, not take candy from strangers, to always be cautious,” he adds. “Then, they take them into a room, throw them onto my lap, and I give them a candy cane. I always have to make sure it’s the child’s decision to come to me, and not the parents.’”

Above all else though, a good Santa plays the role year-round — even when he’s outside of the suit.

A year-round persona

After playing Santa a few times, Taylor realized he was a different man when wearing the suit than he was in everyday life. It brought out his love and compassion — parts of himself he didn’t typically express in his public life before.

“Now, I try to be him every day,” he says. “If traffic is backed up in LA, with horns honking and people screaming, I think ‘How would Santa handle this?’ It was a huge evolution in mental attitude.”

Taylor maintains his beard year-round, typically sports a red shirt, and drives around the city in a little red car with ‘N-POLE’ on the license plate. He is constantly stopped and asked for photos at grocery stores, gas stations, and in parks in the heat of summer.

Even without the suits, many of these men still look like Santa post-Christmas. After all, being Santa comes with the year-round social responsibility to spread joy, they say. But there are also certain benefits to the attention they get for it.

“When you have the image going all the time, it builds more business,” says Marchetti. “I carry business cards with me wherever I go. And when a kid comes up to me in a store, their parent gets one.”

Several of the professional Santas I spoke with resonated sentiments of method actors: Through the process of repeatedly playing a role, they mentally and physically adopted the traits of their character, until the lines distinguishing their real lives from Santa were unrecognizably blurred.

“I became Santa after a few years of playing him,” an Arkansas professional by the name of Santa Willie told me. “Now, when Christmas comes and I put the suit on, nothing changes. It’s just me.”

Hard work, pee, and touching moments

For all of the job’s allure, being Santa is not the easiest way to make money.

“What people don’t realize is how much hard work it is to be a Santa,” says Mitchell Allen, an internet advertiser who brands himself as one of the premier Kris Kringles in all of Texas. “It’s physically, mentally, and emotionally taxing.”

The day we connected, he left his house at 6 am and didn’t return home until 10 pm. For the duration of that time, he had to be high-energy, attentive, and relentlessly in character.

Allen maintains his energy throughout the day by grabbing protein shakes between gigs — always out of the sight of children. The worst thing that could happen, he says, is a small child catching a glimpse of him off-duty, downing a cheeseburger in the parking lot of a Carl’s Jr.

He has two children of his own; only one of them knows about his father’s secret life, and he is often enlisted to help Santa get into costume without being spotted by other kids.

In recent years, Allen began encountering a common problem in the professional Santa community: He had dozens of Saturday booking requests, and not enough time work them all. Instead of losing the business, he recruited other Santas to fill the spots for a cut of the profit. Today, he runs manages a small group of Santas — one of whom is currently working a gig in China.

Another perennial concern among Santas is the possibility of a lap-sitter “making a mess” in action. “I’ve handled children, I’ve handled pets, I’ve handled adults in diapers,” says Allen. “And I have been fortunate in that I’ve never had an accident.”

Others, like 72-year-old ex-realtor Santa Willie, have not been so lucky.

“Last year, at an elementary school visit, a little boy was on my lap telling me about the scooter he wanted,” says Willie. “In the middle of his sentence, he stopped and looked up at me with these big, scared eyes. Then, I felt the warm rush of pee on my leg.”

But the truly warming moments mitigate the misery of unwanted bodily fluids.

“A man once sat on my lap and whispered, ‘I’m 50 years old, and I’ve never done this before,’” says Marchetti. “If that’s not a Santa moment, I’m not sure why I do this at all.”