Santa dancing
Santa-morphisis
From December 13, 2001
“Work like you don’t need the money, dance like nobody’s watching.” Somebody sent me that line, without credit.
Lilly turned 100 recently. She wore glasses like welders use when cutting metal with a blowtorch. Santa is at the Plantation South holiday party, dancing with Lilly. Walking with Lilly was dancing with Lilly. “I’m a hundred years old. It’s a miracle,” she laughed as we walked somewhere in the direction of her room “Oh, God bless you, thank you Santa.”
Dancing with Martha. What a fine dancer she is at, oh, eighty-something. I looked down, Martha’s face looking for me to lead her on, looking around the room at the faces of all those ladies, Mother included, all the faces of those on staff I’ve come to know. Santa was on staff today.
I lifted my head, watched the balloons dancing on the ceiling, the clouds dancing through the high windows. The sense of the heights of human spirit danced all around us. I looked across the room again, just to check. Sure enough only Martha and I are still dancing. The dancing of the others is all in their faces. Betty laughed. “You made Betty laugh. She’s never laughed,” somebody said.
Dancing with Winnie, ninety-something. “You know, Saturday nights I used to buck dance when I was a girl.” Exactly what is buck dancing, Winnie? is it like square dancing? “Why, yes! It is square dancing! You should have seen it. We would move my bed against the wall and make enough room for the boys to come in and we’d buck and dance. Oh My! You should have seen me then!” My head up, my smile pointing at two corners of the room. “And you know? some boy would always end up hiding under my bed until late at night!” Oh Winnie!
Mary and I carry sixty presents to sixty rooms. HO, HO, HO! Merry Christmas! It’s Santa. May I come in? Sweet, old, tiny Eugenia one of my all-time favorites, was a concert pianist once. Well preserved for eighty or more, wanted to make sure she got her kiss from Santa and she got it.
In Lilly’s room. She sat in her special chair with the built-in table. Very fine old furniture in the room, old white oak with carved ornamentation on the dresser drawers, like garland.
“You have to see . . . where is it?” What, Lilly? “It was right there.” She pushes the table aside and slowly gets up. Walks over to the dresser. “It was right on here.” She goes to her walker. Oh, look, I say to Mary. There is a candy cane dressed like Rudolf the Red-nosed Reindeer attached to the front of her walker. We all began singing that song. “Yeah, that’s right,” Lilly said, then gave us a big knee-slapping laugh.
I wonder how Mom felt about having her own personal Santa among all of her newfound friends at Plantation South.
Lynnita is a great friend of ours. Santa didn’t make it to Lynnita’s Mother. She passed away before we could arrange the visit. Today is the wake. Tomorrow is the service at Flipper Temple, near the campus of Morris Brown University, Atlanta. Could I have been her personal Santa? What would she have asked for and could the gift be possible?
(Excerpts from my journal, Santa-morphisis, from the 2001 holiday season, all entries copyright Tom Todaro, 2004. Santa-morphisis is in the trademark process. So don't even think about it. Wink.)
