https://lancasteronline.com/news/local/air-force-veterans-shared-christmas-card-every-year-since-after/article_febdaa0e-c2f8-11e6-8ff5-bf0cdd4e7dd5.html
TOM KNAPP | Staff Writer | December 25, 2016
Santa didn't come to John Norvell's house last year.
The Santa in question is a 1-foot-tall, stand-up Christmas card -- intended for a child -- that Norvell and pal Joseph DiSanto have been sending back and forth every year since 1971.
Norvell, of Canandaigua, New York, last saw the card in 2014, when he sent it to DiSanto's Millersville address.
In 2015 -- for the first time in more than four decades -- it didn't come back.
"I thought it might have gotten lost in the mail. Then I found his obituary," Norvell says.
"It was a shock to think he was gone. It was a shock to realize Santa wouldn't come any more. It was a part of our Christmas tradition for so many years."
Norvell met DiSanto in 1969, when they were stationed with the Air Force in Washington, D.C.
"We were pretty close, back when we were lieutenants," he says. "That was nearly 50 years ago -- it's hard to believe it's been that long."
They hit it off immediately, he says, sharing an offbeat sense of humor and a predilection for good-natured pranks.
"We just clicked," Norvell says.
Their service together ended in 1971, when Norvell was admitted to navigator's school in California.
"I guess he thought it was pretty funny to send me this little kid's card," he says, chuckling. "So I got to thinking, he deserves it back. This is too good not to return. So I sent it back to him.
"Then it came back to me in '73, while I was flying combat missions in Thailand."
That started a tradition that continued nearly 45 years.
Despite a friendship spanning nearly half a century, Norvell says he and DiSanto weren't in frequent contact.
"We didn't speak much," he says. "We sent the card, and we would drop in on each other every few years. Last time I saw him was in the '90s.
"We were always meaning to get together again, but it didn't happen."
That's not uncommon among friends who forged their bonds through the armed forces, Norvell says.
"We didn't really need to talk to each other. The friendship was there, and we knew it," he says.
"Military friendships are hard to explain," he adds. "We didn't have to see each other all the time, but when we got together it was like we'd never been apart."
As for Santa, the ancient card shows its mileage.
Over the years, it has traveled from New York to California, from Vietnam to Alaska, accompanying the two men as they married, moved, had children, changed jobs and retired.
"This is a lifeline that tethers us together, this worn old Santa Claus," DiSanto said in a 2006 interview.
When Norvell last saw it, the cardboard was yellowed, creased and taped together. It was covered, inside and out, with yearly messages.
Some notes refer to current events at the time they were written, including 1975 recession, the Iranian hostage crisis, Princess Diana's death, Y2K and the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
DiSanto, who often wrote his greetings in rhyme, said in 2006 it was "like peering into a time capsule."
DiSanto's ex-wife Kathy, who now lives in West Virginia, says she, too, has fond memories of the card.
She, her ex-husband and Norvell served together in the Air Force, she says, and he was best man at their wedding.
Although she and DiSanto divorced in 1993, she says they remained on good terms.
She was happy to learn the card exchange had continued.
"We had been married just six months, and we decided we should buy something special for John," she says, recalling 1971. "This card was really obnoxious, so John -- proving he could be even more obnoxious than we were -- sent it back the next year. He said it should become a Christmas tradition."
The card meant a lot to her ex-husband, she says. In the years he had it, she says, he kept the card on display in a glass-fronted china cupboard along with other treasured mementos.
"He didn't tuck it away in a drawer, he kept it in a special place," she says.
DiSanto died June 28, 2015, at Mount Joy Hospice Center.
"He probably put Santa away, figuring he would mail it the next Christmas," Norvell says. "But he never did."
He pauses, then adds: "I don't know what happened to the card. It's probably gone."
Not so. Kathy DiSanto says her son, Nick, found the card among his father's effects.
It's en route to Norvell "one last time," she says.
When DiSanto died, Kathy DiSanto says she didn't know how to contact Norvell. She was touched, she says, when he reached out to her.
"That card really meant a lot to both of them. I think it shows that when John didn't get it back last year, he realized something was wrong," she says.
Her ex-husband didn't tell many people he was sick, she adds.
"If Joe had lived another six months, he absolutely would have sent it back. That friendship was very dear to him," she says.
"So I told John, 'Santa's coming back one final time.' He said that brought tears to his eyes."