The telephone call Janet Whiteley received last week first put a special smile on her face and later sent tears of joy trickling down her cheek.
The caller had just extended an invitation, the fourth in as many years, to come to Svetlo Adult Day Care that’s located at 2225 Plainfield Pike and accept yet another extraordinary donation of Christmas gifts. But the gifts aren’t just your ordinary Christmas gifts.
They are what Mayor Joseph Polisena calls “extraordinary acts of human kindness from people who simply want to make Christmas merry for children from needy families.”
They are also gifts that are the direct result of Jasmine Parsadanyan walking into Johnston Town Hall and requesting to talk to someone about how Svetlo Adult Day Care wanted to do something special for children from needy families who live and attend school in the town.
“Ever since then this has become my all-time most favorite part of the holiday season,” Whiteley, who is the administrative aide for Polisena, said. “Some of these people aren’t event originally from this country, yet they are happy … excited to show love and kindness for some needy children in town.”
In keeping with tradition, Whiteley and Bethany Alviano, the town of Johnston’s Tax Collector, made their way to Svetlo Adult Day Care for last Wednesday’s fourth annual Christmas Gift presentation.
The two Johnston staffers were immediately greeted with an embrace from Parsadanyan and Oganess Gevorkian, co-owners of Svetlo Adult Day Care that services people of Russian decent and now include folks from Romania and Spain.
“Welcome, welcome!” Gevorkian began, “it’s so nice of you to come here again. Our people have been looking forward to this for some time now.”
That’s because many of the friendly folks inside Svetlo used their own money and went shopping for Christmas gifts for children from families in need and even specially gift wrapped each and every present for last week’s presentation.
“These people are so full of love and giving,” Whiteley said. “Look at the smiles on their faces; I’ve never witnessed anything quite as unique and heart-warming that’s being shown here by these wonderful people today.”
To which a man who was visiting Svelto and wanted to take in the ceremony and was seemingly overwhelmed by the number of gift wrapped presents under the tree inside Svetlo’s main community room, said, “There are a lot of proud people in this room; just watching the smiles in their faces while they’re singing We Wish You a Merry Christmas speaks volumes for this very special group of people.”
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