I had a conversation recently with Santa Claus.
Perhaps I should clarify that by saying that, no, I did not migrate to the North Pole nor did I find my way to the nearest department store. Rather, I had a wonderful chat with a friend who is a part-time Santa here in the city. His experiences were intriguing.
He left me with a wonderful image that has niggled at my brain since he told me of it. It involves a young client who climbed upon his knee and in an almost inaudible voice told Santa just what she wanted for Christmas. Santa had to ask her to repeat her request. She whispered, "For Christmas, I want to fly."
Has she been overly influenced by Harry Potter or Peter Pan or Mary Poppins? I have no idea, but I have had a delicious flight of fancy imagining Christmas morning and an opened stocking stuffer that says, "Go. One flight per person."
Have you ever felt like asking for the same thing? One flight away from that nagging coworker, the insistent boss, the untidy neighbor, the list of to do things that gets longer and longer... But why waste your flight on those perennials? Go for a glorious soaring over the city to change your perspective and astound anyone lucky enough to spot you high above the building tops. Didn't Dylan Thomas already dream that in a cherished bit of writing?
I'd love to know that little petitioner who eschewed dolls and bicycles for the unusual. She still possesses the gift of thinking beyond the conventional, beyond what is expected, and launching her request with confidence into the ears of the one person who might make it happen since he seems to have mastered the art of flying. I am fairly sure she knows that it might not be given her. But I am equally certain that, with such an imagination, she also has the inner equipment to deal with disappointment.
Christmas is the time for dreaming impossible dreams as we attempt to wrap our minds around our God come to earth as a child born into poverty against a background of angelic song. That almost makes flying seem pedestrian, doesn't is? |