Tommy's friends, neighbors

The Berkshire Eagle, April 24, 2006

Tamirat, otherwise known as Tommy, our adoptee originally from Ethiopia, has been a resident of Stamford for almost a year. It is hard to imagine our family without him; furthermore, the entire region seems to have adopted him.

It has been a year of milestones, from mastering a tricycle to, now, a bicycle with training wheels; seeing his first snow to skiing on it; meeting Santa Claus at the Williamstown Savings Bank and the Easter Bunny at the Big Y; from eating almost exclusively bread to passing through an intense meatball stage and on to a bewildering variety of food preferences — always including pasta, however. He has gone from eating with his fingers from a common bowl, the custom in his country, to eating with a fork and spoon from his own plate.

He spoke a few words of English when we picked him up at the orphanage in Addis Ababa; now he blurts out entire paragraphs, long and often involved stories, even occasionally using the pronoun "I" to replace the third person: "I want" instead of "Tommy wants/" His incessant question now is "why," culminating last week when he asked, "Why is it Thursday?" Indeed, why? In short, in most ways he is pretty much like any other three-year-old in the U.S.

We found a small T-shirt in the back of a drawer the other day, realizing that when we got him the shirt fit. He arrived in this country weighing approximately 28 pounds and standing about 30-inches tall; in a year he has gained seven pounds and five inches, well on his way to being taller than either of his parents.

He maintains a friendly dispute with the weather. He has been for some time expecting the rainy season that will signal summer, as it would have in Ethiopia. We're not even having a rainy season this year to signal spring, as it usually does in this country.

People in stores, in restaurants, in preschool and especially in church have been extremely welcoming and generous. He has many, many friends, peers and adults, as he seeks people out. People almost always respond. The kindness of friends and strangers has been remarkable.

Tommy and his parents eat, from time to time, at The Readsboro Inn, in the Vermont town of that name. Nadia, the owner, recently visited family in South Africa. When we saw her after her return, she reached behind the counter to present Tommy with a four-inch-high elephant she had brought back for him. It was made of soft wire and various shades of blue and red beads. She included a photograph she had taken of the craftsman-street vendor who had made it.

The tusks are finer wire wrapped over thicker wire; the eyes, swirls of fine wire. Beads are strung between a wire outline for ears; beads are wrapped around the wire for a trunk. The tail is a small piece of wire with a curl at the end.

Tommy has received many presents. All are special, this one because Nadia thought of him in the course of her vacation, because it was such a surprise, because he loves pictures and stories of elephants, and because it comes from Africa — not, to be sure, from Ethiopia, but from the same continent.

Let the beaded elephant stand for the spontaneous warmth and welcoming that Tommy has received as he grows from his new friends and neighbors — for which we his parents are grateful.

Anyway, that's how it looks from Stamford, Vermont.

Top