It is almost two years to the day since that drama on the tarmac of Malawi's Lilongwe airport, when Madonna's private jet was refused permission to take off with David Banda on board.
The singer was impatient to fly the boy back to Britain after spotting him in an orphanage and deciding that he was the one she wanted - the one child, out of the million orphans in Malawi, whom she was going to adopt.
The usually ruthlessly efficient Madonna had made one small oversight: she'd forgotten to apply for a passport for the then 13-month-old.
The tense scene at the airport illustrated well her mighty struggle to adopt the child.
She was accused of 'fast-tracking' the adoption because under Malawian law, prospective parents have to be resident in the country for 18 months before adoption can be approved.
Madonna, 50, may have embarked on a mission to save the country with her Raising Malawi project, but she sure as hell didn't fancy sticking around there for 18 months waiting for the go-ahead to take David back to her Marylebone townhouse.
There was further controversy because David was not actually an orphan. His mother, Marita, had died a few days after he was born, but his father Yohane was alive and had placed the child in an orphanage because at the time he was unable to cope with the baby.
David, of course, arrived safely in Britain a few days after that stand-off and was greeted at Heathrow Airport by a frantic scrum of photographers, journalists and television crews.
A taste of things to come. The infant who had been born in a hut in the remote village of Lipunga to a father who earned £50 a year growing onions and tomatoes now has his own room in a Marylebone townhouse, ridiculously expensive toys and clothes, and his food prepared by a team of macrobiotic chefs. And everywhere he goes, he is accompanied by a huge, crazy entourage.
But this madness, the Madonna circus, was supposed to be balanced by a stable family life.
With the announcement that his adoptive parents are to divorce, that is no longer the case.
One of the key factors in the breakdown of the marriage is said to have been Guy's opposition to Madonna's desire to adopt another Malawian child, three-year-old girl Mercy James.
And now there is yet more uncertainty and anguish in the life of the boy they did adopt.
Back in Malawi, the news of the divorce has met with dismay. The majority of Malawians are devout Christians who believe strongly in marriage and the family.
Yesterday a child protection organisation, Eye of the Child, said it would be closely monitoring the situation.
'We will be watching to make sure that the interests of David have been observed in the divorce,' its executive director, Maxwell Mateware, said.
'If that is not the case we will go to court in Malawi to ensure that he is protected.'
Of course no one can deny that David's prospects in Malawi were bleak and that he is now a healthy child who wants for nothing.
But has he ever really known a happy home life? It seems the problems between Madonna and Guy were going on even when they were in Malawi to adopt him.
According to sources out there, they were sleeping in separate beds at their lodge. They weren't happy. David was, in part, an attempt to revive the marriage.
Whether the growing chasm between Madonna and Guy manifested itself in screaming matches, hurt, sulky silences, or both, it is unlikely that little David has been able to be protected entirely from the misery of the disintegrating, now defunct marriage. Even if he is palmed off with the nanny most of the time.
It was the nanny who arrived with David at Guy's 40th birthday party last month at The Punch Bowl, the Mayfair pub owned by the couple. David was decked out in designer tartan and the nanny wore a matching hat.
Whatever upheaval David now faces, there will be at least one constant in his life: there will be no shortage of cute outfits.
So what now? Once the divorce has been finalised, it seems likely that Guy will remain in England - it has been reported that he will keep Ashcombe House, the country estate in Wiltshire - while Madonna will spend more time in America.
Madonna is David's mother, she is a controlling woman. She is certain to want David to be with her. Whatever-settlement is reached, it seems likely that Madonna, by virtue of being the mother, will be granted primary custody of David.
When it became clear that the marriage was terminal earlier this year, Madonna took off to New York, where she feels most comfortable.
In June, she took David to a game of the Cincinnati Reds versus the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium.
She was also seen out and about with David - and nanny in tow of course - along with her friend, Gwyneth Paltrow. And, of course, there was a visit with David to the Kabbalah Centre.
Madonna is obsessed with her own celebrity version of the mystical religion. But whether David will share her enthusiasm is another matter.
New York could become his new home and he faces the prospect of much criss-crossing back and forth across the Atlantic in order to see Guy back in Britain. In time, he may have to get to know a new stepmother and a new stepfather.
The immediate future, however will be taken up with visiting the various cities on the itinerary of his mother's Sticky & Sweet tour.
At the end of last month, Madonna took David and her other son, Rocco, out for a walk in Athens - where she was performing a concert - accompanied, as usual by the massive entourage.
The entourage is a part of David's life, but he continues to appear bewildered by their presence, as if always looking back at his previous life in Malawi.
However much he is spoilt and pampered, however many rocking horses, child- sized BMWs and state-of-the-art music systems and designer outfits his mother buys him, nothing has been able to take away that haunted look in his eyes.
He will be lucky, as he grows older, to escape feelings of guilt over the fact that he has another father, who lives in a village in Malawi where there is no running water or electricity, where the evening meal is nsima, a type of gruel made from maize flour, cooked over a log fire.
His mother's obsession these days is to stay looking as young as possible as she enters her 50s. In Malawi, where an estimated 38 per cent of the population are infected with HIV/AIDS, anyone who reaches that age is regarded as lucky.
His father has remarried and he and his new wife, Flora, have a young son, Dingiswayo, who is nearly three months old.
Dingiswayo, if he is lucky enough to grow into a healthy adult, will become a farmer like his father.
David, meanwhile, will attend a private school somewhere close to where his divorced mother decides to settle. Dingiswayo will grow up in obscurity; David will be scrutinised wherever he goes.
At the outset, when the adoption furore began, David's father Yohane gave a number of interviews - contradictory at times, it must be admitted - which implied he had been given the impression he would still be David's father.
The nice rich lady would simply be taking care of David for him and offering him a better life.
He did not appear to understand the full implications of what he had agreed to do. All of this will weigh heavily on David in the future.
Now that his parents are to divorce, will David still get a sister from Malawi? You might think that Madonna would now give up her plans to adopt Mercy, but Madonna is used to getting her way.
If it happens, David, no doubt, will welcome his new sister as an addition to this now broken family with heartfelt joy. It will bring him closer to Malawi and to his roots.
Back in Lipunga, Yohane will today be thinking of the son he gave away - and wondering if it was a huge mistake for him, but most of all for a confused little boy called David.
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