He’s handsome. He’s strong and radiant, ingenious and restless. He’s resourceful. He’s an internationalist and he is open. He’s sensitive, but not fragile. He’s vigorous and incredibly earthly. However, one moment you see him stuck down to earth and the next moment you see his eyes fly into a parallel and temporarily invisible universe, into a better tomorrow’s world where he belongs. Not among the surrendered crowds. He wants to make a difference, without intention of advertising or ruling. He wants to leave his mark.

I look at him with admiration, with an enormous admiration. I have seldom felt so full of admiration for others. I merely surrender to him not only thanks to my life bonds towards him, but also because in contrast with the majority of people I mingle with, he is the only human being in my 50 years of life who gains my respect one day at a time. His unique qualities lay before my eyes and all it takes to see them is to take a close look at the way he behaves, the way he acts and thinks, and the way he feels and creates. You can’t miss noticing the feel of power in his eyes when he wakes up every morning –the feel of the way inspired writers describe their epic heroes in ancient texts– forcing him to cherish every minute of every day in his life with cunning tenacity.

In his life, delays are out of the question. He opens his eyes, examines the room, and estimates his strength, and right away he attacks life. After announcing his presence with a discreet sound, he strolls carelessly about and with a big smile in his face, he checks out morning weather with his sleepy eye on the sky out the window. Then, he engages with what’s left unfinished from yesterday. He always remembers everything! He grabs his stuff and holds them with intention to manage them rather than possess them. He’s not obsessed with property. You will never hear him say, “This is mine!”. He stares at anything valuable around, trying to figure out a proper use or any use he comes up with and goes on it up to the moment when he possesses full knowledge of its utility. When he gets bored, he doesn’t throw it away, he doesn’t discard it nor does he trash it. He places it in a prominent spot to pay it a future visit.  He’ll need it some day soon.

And then comes the time to get out in the world. He stands upright on his feet and opens his eyes wide to suck on each and every image, each and every experience. He’s not afraid of strangers. He approaches them with confidence and trust on his own instinct.  He allows each and everyone the time they deserve. His antennas are up, you can’t miss noticing it. He’s not a snob or rude, nor is he impulsive. He obviously knows he has something to earn from everybody. He knows that he has the opportunity to earn knowledge, love, fun, opinion, team spirit, a shoulder to lean on or a hug to relax.

He’s both extrovert and cautious. He’s not interested in skin tones, whether black, yellow or red. All he’s interested in is to ensure both heartbeats are tuned up and spot his favourites in order to decide whether to engage for long or short-lasting relationships.

He hangs on unfamiliar words and languages sounding around him. He’s not scared of the unknown, the different, the bizarre. He seems to enjoy diversity. He’s not looking to spot discrepancies or similarities between himself and other special creatures. He avoids wasting time on fear. He prefers investing his time on mutual virtues and thus fit himself into the different special microcosms that surround him.

He doesn’t act naïve nor compliant, when he embraces diversity. He’s fully aware of his living space’s boundaries and his personal strength. So, he simply allows others to enter his private space and time. He sets his boundaries in a pretty coordinate and explicit way, with obvious willingness to respect others’ boundaries in his turn, occasionally embarrassing them with his exceptional behaviour, thus earning himself a mute advantage with no effort at all. He doesn’t act selfish. It’s in his nature. Better than me, he may know deep inside that failure and hurt are part of the game. However, it’s smarter and faster to get out of the hole rather than standing long hours above it looking to find a way to sidestep it. Let us also not forget the treasures one may find hidden in a hole. You never know.

He’s not showing off. Regardless of his outfit, he’s always handsome without a doubt. He doesn’t force admiration on others using borrowed tricks. He tries to inspire admiration based on his own resources of behaviours and actions. He seems to know that clothes are made to put them on rather than put one away. He has too many advantages, abilities and imaginative ideas to demonstrate, to be merely satisfied by visible appearance.

He avoids excess in his diet the same way he avoids excess in his image. He never overeats and leaves the dinner table the moment he suspects he may be out of the advisable food plan, avoiding to harm his good health and waste excess food. I have often noticed him giving me the bad eye in an effort to criticise or control me for the dish cluttering on table thanks to a so-called affluence. He shapes his body to be agile, flexible, strong and clean, thus physically supporting him to pursue his most keen desires. He knows that a heavy body carries a heavy, fatty and ponderous mind.

He scans everything around him, as if he knows that it’s automatically recorded on his minds’ hard disk, available to be dragged up for future reference. He acts as if he has discovered the universal secret of linking everything to everything. I’m not puzzled with the fact that he behaves with people in the same way as he behaves with objects. He seems to have everything organized on an elaborate fibre system in his brain, like a universal ball of firmly attached threads.

He avoids watching television. He turns his gaze briefly on the screen, as if it were an extra window to the world and not the real world nor the bigger world. He just looks at it to keep in contact with an extra reality, without desire to overrate it. Possibly, he knows inside that he represents the New Man, the man who refuses to build his New World with rummage.

I could go on speaking forever about him. We named him Apollon, he’s two years old and he’s my precious son. He’s the most profound, sincere and endless love of my life. He represents the most valuable, harsh and challenging lesson I have ever taught myself. With his small everyday actions, he teaches me the proper way of living one’s life and expressing one’s feelings, the proper way of accepting and refusing, the proper way of building a new country, New Greece. The hurting truth is that in his early archetypal wisdom about life lays the knowledge that I’m merely one in thousands of charlatans who founded his country, his homeland, his planet on poor sloppiness and irreversible mess. However, I take pleasure in knowing that even in my old age I have met the finest teacher to teach me the new art of saving what’s worth saving.