Nery Ynclan. Published Sunday, January 9, 2000, in the Miami Herald.
The thought of Elian's returning to Cuba to stand at Castro's side before some mock demonstration is sickening.
Lost at sea: one boy, age 5. It would take a miracle to save him.
Word of his numbing story hit me as if it had been my own relatives miserably drowned in the darkness between Miami and Castro's Cuba. Is it because I'm Cuban American, or did we all want to take Elian in our arms in a hug so big that all that horror couldn't hurt him again? How many thought as
I did?: If he hasn't relatives, I'll adopt him. I'll save you, Elian. Hang on to the raft, Elian -- I'll never let you go.
The miracle would find Elian. We rejoiced this Thanksgiving fairy tale with Toys R Us and Disney, go-carts, go-planes, baseball bats, birthday parties, promise of a college education, more toys, more toys and don't forget the puppy. Anything else, Elian? You name it.
Is it because I'm Cuban American, a refugee child myself, that I understand the excess, the pain, the demonstrators, the lost look on Elian's face when the first camera found him?
Within hours of the boy's arrival the picture of him laying on a dock, his eyes frozen in shock, appeared on a poster to draw attention to Fidel Castro's possible visit to Seattle. He was an instant symbol, an instant celebrity. So for Elian, the boy, the tempest had not ended at sea -- that was
just Act One.
The villain is one as colorful and pitiful and transparent as they come.
Fidel, can I call you Fidel? Do you expect us to believe that you care about this boy? His family? Would you have us believe that hundreds of thousands of people spontaneously poured out into the streets of Havana with handsome signs to demand the return of the boy?
Family reunification, family rights, the United States has kidnapped our boy!
Fidel, you and all of us touched by your 40 years of tyranny know that if you had zipped by on a government yacht and seen Elian bobbing in the water with his family, you would have pushed his head under and sent his mother to jail.
Cut to Miami for Act Two.
To the world beyond South Florida, it's those crazy Cubans demonstrating again, eagerly rolling out the really, really big Cuban flag again.
They argue to anyone who will listen:
The boy's Miami family wants him, his mother died to get him here, and his father, under Castro's choke hold, can't be believed. Elian, we'll save you. We'll never let go.
Yes, we wish Elian could stay. Yes, his mother paid the dearest price. And yes, you can't live in Miami and not know that all things Castro are tainted. But here's the rub. This boy's father is Castro's public-relations hostage. We don't know and will never know what is truly in his heart, if he
truly gave his ex-wife permission to leave the island with his son as some claim or if he truly wants him back.
Even if Castro allows him to come here to pick up his son, Elian's father can't risk a change of heart and jeopardize his family in Cuba. And for those with the fantasy that Castro should allow his whole family to come to the United States for a hearing -- stop dreaming.
And so we arrive at Act Three.
Elian, the symbol, has been a compelling one. The demonstrators are out there because the boy represents every Cuban rafter saved and lost, every Cuban separated from his family and homeland, every Cuban political prisoner executed or forgotten, every empty stomach on the island just 90 miles
away.
His story has gotten more air time and ink than the Pope's visit or Castro's cigars.
The Cuban exile community can rejoice that Elian, the symbol, has gotten their message out.
So now what about Elian, the boy?
When you peel away all the political layers, we're left with a very young child, barely 6, who survived a profound trauma at sea only to be drowned in celebrity by all of us.
The thought of Elian's returning to Cuba to stand at Castro's side before some mock demonstration is sickening. But when I think of the boy, just him, I wonder, did he witness his mother and stepfather drowning, or did he awake to find them gone? Did he yell to her, Mami, Mami, where are you?
Does he cry? Have we let him cry?
For myself, I would live in the poorest, most repressive spit of dirt on Earth with my family than be without them somewhere else, no matter how magical, how Disney, no matter how wonderful my new relatives may be.
HOME TO HEAL
Perhaps Elian's father did think the boy would be better off with his mother and stepfather in the land of opportunity, but with them gone, I suspect he wants his son out of the limelight, home and healing.
If this were a Hollywood script, Elian's relatives would all be allowed to join him in the United States and the party would last for days. But it's a Miami story -- you know the kind: the airport, the cameras, the screaming relatives, the Cuban flag, the lump in your throat.
This boy is still lost in a tempest. We have to save him -- this time by letting go.
Nery Ynclan is The Herald's media and outreach editor. nynclan@herald.com |