My friend Maria Valdesuso, long-time Clyde Hill resident, does not consider Peter Pan a children’s tale. On Aug. 29 she marked the 50th anniversary of her arrival in Miami, one child among the 14,000 airlifted from Cuba between 1960 and 1962, many to become orphans here, when right-wing dictator Fulgencio Batista lost his job to revolutionary left-wing dictator Fidel Castro.

She came in the largely-unknown-outside-of-Florida “Peter Pan” Airlift.  Why such large-scale emigration? Middle and upper-class parents feared for their children’s safety.

Unlike the Peter Pan character who would never grow up, Maria had to grow up fast. She remembers waiting in a hospital for an appendectomy at the age of eight, when Castro’s revolutionary forces took control of the city where she lived. On her 11th birthday, the authorities granted her permission to leave Cuba, the first in her family to go.

Eventually, Maria’s brothers followed her to Miami. After waiting in a refugee camp for a month, the boys were sent to Washington state. When her parents finally received exit visas, the family was reunited in Tacoma, becoming subjects of a local newspaper article because Cubans here were so novel. They survived through the generosity of others and her father’s willingness to become a janitor after years of running a successful furniture business back home. “No other country is as generous as this one,” she says. This helps explain why years later Maria has dedicated her life to helping new Spanish-speaking immigrants make a successful transition to life in the U.S.

Happy anniversary, Maria. I’m glad you’re here.

Ann Oxrieder has lived in Bellevue for 35 years. She retired after 25 years as an administrator in the Bellevue School District and now blogs about retirement at http://stillalife.wordpress.com/.