A Smile from Devlin

About a month ago my son Devlin, who loves horror and is fascinated by special effects makeup, brought me a magazine that he'd been looking through. There was a picture of a child who needed surgery for cleft palate, and he asked me how they did that makeup effect and how the prothetics were applied. I explained that it wasn't makeup and that these children had a birth defect and needed to have surgery to correct this condition. He became very concerned and asked if they were in pain and who was going to help them, and I told him that this was an ad for a charity and that they were trying to raise money to pay for surgery. He dropped the subject and I wondered if it had been too upsetting or overwhelming for him to think about.
Today he came up to me, seemingly out of the blue, and asked if we could send some money to help the kids with their "mouths broken so they can get fixed by a doctor".  Although it had been a month ago, I knew exactly what he was talking about because I remembered our conversation so well, and how deeply affected he'd seemed.  I was impressed and incredibly touched by the fact that he had obviously been thinking about this and realized that there might be something he could do.  I was proud of him for the depth of his feeling and for his ability to feel hope for others. The charity is called SmileTrain.org, and we are going to go online together and make a donation. It's sad to learn that there are others suffering, but I want him to know that there is always hope.