My son wrote this letter right before Christmas in 2008. He was 9 years old at the time. When a little boy is that age, a few days before Christmas he should be dreaming of all the toys he is going to get on the “big day”, pining over the ones he might not get – and making sure he’s been a good boy all year so Santa doesn’t forget him. Not Korbin. Not that year.
Korbin disappeared down to his room right after dinner. My sweet little blonde haired son Korbin, who was usually jovial and fun-loving, who liked goofing off and watching re-runs of SpongeBob, was all of a sudden sullen. He reappeared back up into the family room a while later, with this piece of paper in his hand.
“Dad. I wrote Sandie a letter.”
He handed it to me. I quickly read it, and a tear welled up in my eye. I fought hard to hold it back.
“I thought maybe if I sent her a letter she wouldn’t take away our house.”
I fought back the tears. I knew I couldn’t cry in front of my youngest son, I didn’t want him to see my weakness. I put my arms around him and gave him a long hug. His tiny body was too young, his fragile little soul was too sweet to have to be experiencing this, stressing over this.
It had only been a day since the sheriff posted a “writ of execution” on our door, informing us that our home would be sold at auction to pay Sandie’s attorneys fees. Though I’d tried to keep it a secret, things of this magnitude just have a way of not being secret for too long, especially when it comes to kids.
“Dad. Do you think the letter will work?” he said, looking up at me with his big green eyes. I could see the innocence and the optimism still in his cute face. Life hadn’t screwed him yet.
“I don’t know if it will work. We can send it to her and try.”
“Ok. Thanks Dad. Let’s send it to her so maybe we can stay here for Christmas. If we have to move, Santa Claus won’t know where to bring the presents.”
“You’re right. We’d better make sure we can stay here for Christmas. You’ve got a lot of stuff coming from Santa.”
His face lit up with a smile. “Dad. I have a better idea. I am going to make copies of my letter and take them up to Sandie’s house for her Christmas party. Maybe if I give them to all of her friends, she’ll let us keep the house.”
“Ok, you can do whatever you want. If you want to hand out the letters, I’ll drive you up there.”
“Love you Dad. I think it will work.”
“Me too. Now get to bed, we have a lot to do before Santa comes. I love you.”
“Love you too Dad.”
He raced back down to his room, wind back in his sails again. Within a month, the house was gone, and all of our hopes and dreams and hard work were down the toilet. Of course, Sandie was the one who bought the house at the auction. And then sold it to a NuSkin employee for a $400,000 profit two months later.
The kids had to change schools in the middle of the school year, lost all their friends, and have still never recovered from getting so far behind in school. I have never recovered from losing the home that I built from the ground up, the home that took me three years of my life to build, every day spent working and staining baseboard and mouldings and installing travertine.
Just another day in the life of Sandie Tillotson — ruining lives, taking things away from people, and making LOTS and LOTS of money on other people’s misery. A nice tidy profit of $400,000.
