Wilson mystery resolved, revealed

It's time to come clean about Wilson. Yes, all you faithful readers know that a search at his last known location -- the top of Mount Adams, Washington, revealed that he was no longer tethered to  the building constructed than a lifetime ago by a mining company. So, where was the unbreakable ball that had inspired so many to bring the power of play to children everywhere?

Well, the naked truth is that someone snatched Wilson, and that futbolknapping took place only days after Wilson was planted atop the mountain on July 4, 2015, by Julia Davis, a prosecuting attorney with Yakima County, Washington, who climbed Mount Adams with Chad Janis, a detective with the Yakima Police Department.

Do you know this man?

An unidentified member of the team that plucked Wilson from atop Mount Adams.

Wilson enjoyed less than four weeks overlooking the mountains and valleys surrounding Mount Adams before a group of hikers plucked The Unbreakable from its perch on July 29, 2018. We have attempted to track the individuals involved, but the photo of the hiker, above, is the closest we can come to be able to identify the persons who, we hope, ended Wilson's isolation and brought it back into the company of children of all ages.

And how did we discover this? Because my hiking trainer, Roger Matthews, scoured the internet and came across videos that hikers had recorded when they successfully climbed Adams after our abortive ascent. And here are some images from those videos.

Video reveals hiker beholding Wilson atop Mount Adams.

THE SMOKING GUN: Proof that Wilson was stripped of its tether and removed from its perch.

This presented a problem for Roger and me. Readers loved Wilson, just like kids love Santa Claus. When was it going to be the appropriate time to spill the beans that Wilson has been packed off? And did you really want to know that? And how do we know that the e-mails we were directing to Wilson at the summit of Mount Adams weren't somehow forwarded, or that Wilson was receiving them anyway through The Unbreakable's almost magical powers? And didn't Wilson's spirit live on regardless of where Wilson is?

As the cold truth sank in -- that Wilson wasn't atop Adams, we realized there is a broader message here, and this is best exemplified by the photo below, taken at the Dzaleka Refugee Camp in Lilongwe barely two weeks ago. Dzaleka has between 30,000 and 40,000 refugees from several African nations, and that means lots of kids. I had Jean Baptiste hanging from my backpack when I spotted a number of those children kicking around a ball made of plastic bags, just as we were told they did.

Art of the deal: Jean Baptiste swapped for a plastic bag ball at Dzaleka refugee camp.

So now you know what became of my little backpacking hiking friend, Jean Baptiste, as well. -- I practiced the Art of the Deal, and traded off my little friend for that rag ball pictured above, which I brought home, by the way. None of those kids argued with me. They wanted Jean Baptiste. The last time I saw the tiniest One World Futbol I ever packed, a passel of kids were having a great time chasing after it across hard-packed ground at the camp.

Does Wilson still "exist?"

So this confronts us with a nagging question: Does Wilson exist any more?

You'll have to ask the New York Sun. . .

Just as, 120 years ago, the New York Sun told a little girl that "Yes Virginia. There is a Santa Claus", I'm here to tell you that yes, Readers, there is a Wilson. In the words of the New York Sun, 

. . . He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Wilsons... There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Wilson! You might as well not believe in the man who saw images of children chasing rags for their entertainment and thinking there must be a better way! You might as well not believe in a famous vocalist whose inner voice called him to provide the funds to create the prototype that would lead to more than 2 million Wilsons finding their way around the world to 60 million children of all ages. 

You may as well not believe in the donors who paid for all those Wilsons, not because they were asked, but because they wanted others to discover the power of play. You may have friends who cannot see the love that this ball represents, but  even if they do not see it, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see.  Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, readers, in all this world there is nothing else more real and abiding.

No Wilson? Wilson lives. He lives in the sound of  a thousand children smiling and the tromp of their feet as they race across hard-packed earth, lost in play, building friendships, and forgetting for the moment the stress of poverty and displacement . . .

OK, so maybe that adaptation is not as well crafted as the original editorial. But it's just as true. The Spirit of Wilson lives in all of us.

There's lots more to tell about what happened in Lilongwe, and there's a tale coming up about developments for Cambodia. Please stay tuned. And I'm not asking for more donations. But if you want to, the link to my donations page is in the top right margin of this page, and I've almost depleted my stock of Wilsons.

Love,
Robert

and Shu