The angel of upper Makiki

By Bob Krauss
Advertiser Columnist

David W. Eyre is almost convinced that "The Miracle on 34th Street" is happening in our Honolulu at the top of Ke'eaumoku Place in the form of an angel instead of Santa Claus.

Understand that Eyre, a former cynical newspaperman, is a self-professed agnostic. Here's what happened:

His neighbor in the rarified atmosphere of upper Makiki, Molly Nurse, had him over for a bowl of chili. She gave him a bunch of crystals the size of golf balls strung on a stem like a cluster of grapes. He took them home as Christmas decorations.

Since his Cynthia is gone and he's approaching 90, the decorations are sparse: two potted poinsettias and a bonsai banyan hung with golden apples. The crystals went into a bowl on his coffee table propped up so they look like they're floating in water.

On Dec. 11, Eyre's two grandchildren came over; Makana, age 12, and Alea, 7, who sat with him on the sofa. Eyre sipped a martini. Alea drank strawberry juice. They got to talking about Christmas, then Jesus and angels. "You have a guardian angel, Gampa," she assured him.

Eyre smiled his agnostic smile and forgot about it. The fact is, he looks more saintly every day with his halo of curly white hair and pixie smile.

The next day Molly Nurse came over to see what he'd done with her grape crystals. She looked down and said, "I see a picture in the bowl." Eyre came over to look. There was the angel with its wings spread.

"Coming a day after Alea told me that I had a guardian angel, I was fascinated," he said. "Then I thought, can anyone explain how this happened?"

I suggested diplomatically that the scientific way of finding out is to move the bowl on the kitchen table and see if the angel is still there.

"I'm not going to take a chance," he said.

The reason he invited me over was to verify the existence of his angel. To be honest, it took me quite a while to focus properly and David grew rather impatient, as if I was dim-witted. But, then, I've never been good at locating Pele's face in the steam clouds, either.

He confessed that the angel was also a little fuzzy to his grandchildren.

However, the angel appeared in living color to Coby Black, the writer, a dinner guest, and Shaunnagh Robbins who took pictures of it. But they haven't been developed yet. And Eyre's son, David L., can see the angel as plain as day.

This experience has clearly impacted Eyre's view of miracles.

"I got to thinking, you hear about people seeing visions of the Virgin Mary," he said, pondering. "Here I have an angel right on my coffee table. If people find out about it they might flock to my door to see the miracle. How much do you think I should charge?"

Bob Krauss can be reached at 525-8073.