Bucharest Airport, December, 1998
By then my beard was completely white. But I didn't really know it.
My cheeks have always been rosy. Just happened. My sons cheeks do it too.
In the airport lounge, minding my own business, when this Rumanian kid, looks maybe 6, walks right into my space and, leaning on my lap, says "Santa?".
Such a smile. Such gladness in his eyes.
Interesting kid, I found out. Actually, about 12.
On his way to the American heartland.
His adoptive parents, missionaries, had spent the last 7 months getting him ready to leave Ceaucescu's mass orphanages, where he had lived since his birth.
The Dictator, obsessed with fecundity, outlawed birth control, both before and after conception. The mothers only option was the baby factories which filled myriad orphanages, cribs filling vast rooms, one next to each other, no room to pass among them.
This boy, I was told, was feral and without language when they met him.
Docile mostly, but when food entered the room - an animal, all claws and teeth, climbing across furniture and folks, battling to assure his survival.
Now, a few months later, smile beaming, looking beseechingly unto my eyes - "Santa?"
When I got home, I trimmed my now white beard, not yet ready to be a mythical old man.
And that was years ago now.
Still I think of him as these December 2010 days wend towards Yuletide yet again.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
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Bice, Nice post. Loved the short sentences. I don't think of you as Santa, but can see how a boy in and airport would. I once had a beard but shaved it off when I was 29. I suspect if I were to grow it back. I'd discover that I'm at least a salt and pepper Santa if not a full fledged Santa. Happy Holidays.
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