Do You Believe?

I woke up this morning with a start.  It was later than I usually wake, around 9:15 am.  I had been awake for part of the night/morning and finally fell back asleep somewhere after 7 am.  Immediately I realized my heart was racing.  I had been dreaming about my friend J who passed away in late March.  We were sitting at a kitchen table.  If I really look around it was not my house, it was not her house.  It was not the house I grew up in, which is where I usually dream dreams of being at home.  It was my Grandma's kitchen.  I don't really know why I would dream us in my Grandma's kitchen, J had never been there. But if I had to guess I would say that it indicates that J and Grandma are together.  But I don't know.

I had so many questions for J, mostly about what is going on with her family.  Very recently I have been aware of a situation within her family that is most unfortunate.  It happened after she passed.  So I asked her about it as I fussed around trying to make coffee or something.   She sat at the table, looking so beautiful and so peaceful.  If I really think about it and concentrate on this dream, someone was in the living room waiting, and I think it was my Grandma.  Sure wish she had come into the kitchen to say Hi, but I think she was there for moral support for J. 

We spoke about the situation and she told me how she knows her son will get through it, that he is strong and has good support in his dad.  I was relieved to hear that because watching from the sidelines has been difficult and I keep wondering if I should reach out to him and see if he's OK.  It cannot be easy for him to be going through this so soon after he lost his mom.  She told me that he has, of course, moved back home and things would be OK.

We didn't talk about her but I could see by looking at her and being near her that she looked at peace.  She told me she was fine.  She looked the same as always.  She had her hair, she wore her glasses.  She was my J and she didn't want to dwell on herself, just wanted to assure me her son would be fine.

So, do you believe that was an actual visit or just a vivid dream?  I believe it was a visit.  It's happened to me before with a friend who had passed away a long time ago.  M was only 21 at the time, I was 22.  He died of a brain tumor and I was devastated to lose him.  I had a very hard time coping.  It was my first serious brush with losing someone so close to me.  It was several weeks, maybe even months after he passed away that I saw him.  I could not get him out of my mind and cried a lot.  Then one morning, as if in a dream, he appeared to me.  He sat on the edge of my bed looking almost luminescent.  He told me he was fine, to stop worrying about him and to go on with my life.  I was filled with such peace after that and was able to move on.  I've never forgotten him or that visit, obviously, but I was able to move past it. 

I think you have to be open to such visits for them to actually occur.  I would give anything to have them more frequently.  I would love to see my Grandma, J, M.... hell even Butthole can come visit me if he wants to!  It's beautiful and meaningful and has given me a sense of calm about losing J.  Seeing her looking well and knowing my Grandma is with her, showing her the ropes if you will has been amazing. Maybe it's crazy to believe that, but if something like that can give me peace, so be it.  I'll take the crazy label.

Three Years

It's hard for me to believe that it's been three years since I lost her.  One of the most important people in my life, my Grandma.  I'm lucky, so so lucky I had her for as long as I did.  I was 42 when she passed away, she was 99.  October 1, 2008.  Only 3 weeks from her 100th birthday.

I've written about her before, several times.  One of the things I wanted to accomplish with this blog was to let others know her too.  If only everyone could have known her in person.  She was so beautiful, so funny, so smart, the best cook ever, someone I could tell anything to, someone who never ever judged.   So often I find myself wanting to talk to her, ask for advice on some things, cook with her, eat with her, just be in her presence again.  Any time I was with her, I felt like the luckiest person alive.  I so wish I had an answering machine message from her saved somewhere. They always made me smile and went something like this....

"Lalia, Can you come and take me to Gallucci's?
*pause*
*pause*
*pause*
This is Grandma, I love you."

Remembering that, hearing it in my head, makes me very emotional.  The message wasn't particularly clear ever.  She never would say when she wanted to go or anything like that.  She didn't mince words.  I'd just call her back and we'd figure out a time to go.  Gallucci's, by the way, is the greatest Italian foods store in Cleveland.  And when we went there it was heaven.  The aroma of the place is intoxicating.  I want to wear it as cologne!  I loved going with her.  Everyone knew her, everyone took care to make sure she got the best of what she was buying, and we always had a feast when we got back to her house.  We would sit at her kitchen table with a little wine or maybe some espresso, and then start opening our bags and laying our feast out on the table.   Delicious crusty bread that you pull apart with your hands, five or six different kinds of olives, super sharp provolone and fontinella, salami, pepperoni, capicola and sopressata.  Absolutely the best.

I miss those days with her.  Just her and I.  We talked about everything.  She told me stories about her life that always somehow related to something I was going through or having trouble with.  She was so smart and so intuitive.  She loved her family with a fierceness that really doesn't seem as prevalent today.  I don't know that I can explain what I mean by fierce love, but I'll try.  When she loved you, she held you close to her heart.  You knew.  You knew you were in there and there isn't a better place in the world to be.  And no matter how she was treated by other family members, because yes, there were people in our family who didn't treat her with the respect she deserved, she loved and held everyone close.  She only wanted everyone to get along and be together.  It didn't always happen.  But I can say we tried, for her sake.  I can't say the same for others and still can't, as fights and lawsuits continue so the greedy side can get what they seem to think they deserve.   Death sometimes brings out the very worst in people.

But for me, I continue to honor her from the tattoo of her on my arm to wearing her wedding band every day.  Whenever I put it on I think of her.  I feel so lucky that I get to wear it now.

Yes, I'm lucky.  I'm lucky I had her in my life for so long.  I'm lucky she lived so close to me.  I'm lucky that she loved me.  I'm lucky that I learned as much as I did from her, even though I wish I could have learned more.  I don't think I would have ever stopped learning from her.  I wish everyone could have known her.

Cemetery

My maternal Grandfather died when I was seven years old.  I didn't really know him well and when I did see him, I was a little afraid of him.  He had a very thick Italian accent and I wasn't around him enough to feel comfortable with it.  He was already pretty old then, in 1974.  My Grandma was much younger than him.  Theirs was an arranged marriage, and a rather interesting story. Grandma was the oldest of eight children and stopped going to school in the third grade.  She was needed to help raise the rest of the children.  The way I remember this story from the many times she told it to me, my great grandfather ran a little gambling circuit in the basement of their house.  Grandma was about 14 at this time and my Grandfather would come to the house to gamble. Well, he caught Grandma's eye when he went through the house to get to the basement.  She thought he was very handsome.  He was in his mid to late 20's at the time.

She wanted him to notice her.  And isn't that typical? Seems teenagers in the '20's weren't much different than they are today!   Times were definitely different though because she was not allowed to speak to him.  So she came up with a plan and implemented it immediately. The next time he came through the house, she took a piece of paper, crumpled it up and threw it at him.  And it hit him, grabbing his attention.  That was all it took for my great grandfather to demand that he marry her.  And so, they were married.

And they stayed married and developed that enduring kind of love that people only dream about having.  They had three children, two boys and a girl (my mom).  He gave her space, which was not something that was the norm for old country Italians.  She was an independent though and I don't think he could have kept her in check even if he had tried. She traveled without him, she didn't go to church ever and she worked most of her life.  Maybe that's why she was able to live, and go on after he died. So often in relationships such as theirs, when one dies the other soon follows.  But she kept herself going.  She is someone who I feel privileged to have had in my life.  A role model for sure.

When my Grandfather passed away, he was buried at Calvary Cemetery in Cleveland.  All the old Italians (and others) were buried there.  It was the place to be seen after you die.  It was huge and sprawling and you needed a map to find the grave you were looking for.  But through the years the neighborhood around it got worse and worse.  There were reports of mourners being robbed while visiting the graves of loved ones.  Eventually Grandma couldn't go there any longer.  That bothered her.  She needed to go there to be near him, to tell him how much she missed him.  And slowly it dawned on her. Her plot was right next to him.  If she couldn't go to see him, then who would go there to see her?

And that's when she hatched the idea to move him.  Over the years, a new go to cemetery was being used by the family.   So against the advisement of her son, she sold her plot at Calvary, bought a two new ones and made arrangements for my Grandfather's body to be exhumed and moved to this new cemetery.  A place where she could go see him and she knew people would go to see her. It cost a bundle, but she didn't care. It was something she had to do if for no other reason than to give her peace of mind.  And it did.

I go to that cemetery now from time to time even though I don't believe I need to go there to speak to her.  I talk to her all the time, anywhere and everywhere.  She's always with me.  But that cemetery was important to her.  So I go.  I bring flowers for her and my Grandfather and say hi to all the other relatives that are nearby.   Sometimes it seems silly to be doing it.  But it wasn't silly to her so I go, with all the love I still have for her and always will have.

Sold

My Grandma's house sold this week.  I've had a hard time wrapping my hairdo around how I feel about that. On the one hand, it needed to sell.  Grandma's been gone for coming on three years now and with no one living there, it was just sucking money.  On the other hand, it's a part of our family history and it's sad to let it go.

Christmas at Grandma's was something to behold.  This little woman, and I only mean that literally, because to me she was larger than life, did tremendous things in that basement kitchen.  Like most old world Italians, a second kitchen in the basement was a must. Her house was small but she managed to fit about 30 of us at a long table on the other side of the basement, for Christmas dinner (and also for Easter brunch).  And once you were in your seat, don't even think about getting up.  You were there for the duration of the meal.  And what a meal!   Is there anything better than Grandma's food?  I honestly don't think there is.  And Christmas was the crowning glory.  She made everything from scratch... sausage, sauce, cavatelli, meatballs, bread.  My mouth waters just thinking about it.

She would start at least a month in advance making the cavatelli by hand and then freezing them.  She made over 30 pounds, usually by herself.  That's a lot of cavatelli.  But she would never ever not have enough.  It would be a disgrace to not have enough food for your guests.  And believe me, she never ever ran out of food.  She also made pounds and pounds of her own pork sausage, meatballs, and loaves of bread.  Everything was perfect and delicious.  Funny thing, she hated ground beef.  Absolutely hated it.  She always said it went back to the days of the Depression when ground beef was the only meat they could get.  Once things got better she never ate ground beef again.  But she had to make sure the meatballs were good so she would try a little piece of the raw meat after she seasoned it to make sure it was good and seasoned properly.  She also made veal cutlets when times were good, pork cutlets when times were a little harder.

The table is already set and has been for about a month.  So come in and take your seat.  Just turn your plate over since it's upside down, she didn't want dust in her food and setting the table that far in advance that was a possibility.  Pass your bowl down and she will give you a handful of salad.  Yes, literally a handful.  Don't worry, she's clean.  And the salad is as perfect as everything else, dressed simply with olive oil and red wine vinegar, some salt and pepper and dried basil and oregano.

The main event is coming and everyone is buzzing with anticipation.  The room is loud with all the conversations going.  But we can't wait to sink our teeth into those succulent pillows of flavor.  The sauce had been cooking all day and the aroma in the house is intoxicating.  I could drink her sauce by the glass, it's so good.  And suddenly my uncle gets up and pulls out a chair and turns it around.  Then he goes out into the kitchen and returns with a huge restaurant size pan of piping hot cavatelli with just the perfect amount of sauce on it and sets it on the chair.  Grandma appears then, apron still on and small sauce pan in hand.  And one by one we send our dishes down to her and she scoops that little pan into the cavatelli and pours it on each plate.  They are then sent back around the table until everyone has some.

Grandma disappears back into the kitchen with my mom and uncle and they come out with bowls and bowls of sausage, meatballs, neckbones, pigsfeet and those veal or pork cutlets and set them in different parts of the long table.  Back to the kitchen to get bowls of extra sauce in case anyone wants some, baskets of fresh from the oven bread and bowls of grated Parmesan.  Everyone passes bowls around, takes what they want and when we are finally all seated and have our food, the youngest family member is asked to say grace.  And then, finally we eat!   The loud raucous conversations die out completely because everyone is too busy basking in the joy of this meal we have once a year.  Wine is pouring freely into the glasses and everyone is full of the joy of being together and eating.

Once everyone has had their fill and then some, it's pretty much a given everyone will over indulge, Grandma, who has barely eaten because she is so consumed with everyone else eating, goes back into the kitchen and comes out with a big platter of raw vegetables.  Carrots, radishes, celery and of course, finocchio (or fennel).  It's an important part of the meal, having that finocchio, a digestive.  Especially back in the days when I was a small child.  Back then, after this feast I just described and then after the veggies, Grandma would then come out with a full roasted capon, potatoes, and roasted vegetables.  Hardly anyone ever ate the second meal after having the huge pasta feast so eventually she stopped making it. 

It's memories like this that make me know I will forever miss that house, like I miss her.  She was my heart.  Losing her was the most awful thing ever even though I knew she wasn't going to live forever.  She was 99 when she left this earth, 3 weeks before her 100th birthday.  A beautiful soul that I was so lucky to have in my life as long as I did.  Even though it feels like it was not enough.

She's gone and when the house closes it will be gone too.  And it will be final, really really final.  And all at once it makes me so very sad and yet, it makes me glad too.  Because not all the memories in that house are happy ones.  But that is another story for another day.  Today I want to remember how much I loved her, always, how much I miss her, how much I loved her cooking and any time I could be around her.

Pulling an Grandma is Now Pulling a Mom

Once upon a time, a daughter went to her parents house weekly to help them out with household chores and errands.  On such occasions, the mother would occasionally buy said daughter (me), as well as herself and the father an instant lottery ticket.

Enough of that, this is no fairy tale.  My mom has picked up right where Grandma left off on the instant lottery bandwagon.  Grandma loved gambling of any kind.  Generally speaking, I think it's a waste of money but if someone wants to buy me a ticket then sure, I'll do the scratchy scratchy.   On one of these occasions, mom decided to splurge and bought three $5 instant tickets... one for her, one for dad and one for me.  As is usually the case, I forgot about the ticket right after I threw it in my purse.

Several days later my mom calls me and asks me if I scratched my ticket.  She sounds weird, mysterious and kind of shifty.   I told her I forgot about it and then I said, "you sound weird, what...are you pulling a Grandma and thinking you won $150,000?"  She says, "yes."   Oh boy, here we go again.  My Grandma was notorious for thinking she won the lottery.  I cannot tell you how many times she's called me, convinced she was the next instant millionaire.  But in her defense, she wasn't so great with the reading and writing, having only completed school to the third grade.  So she often misinterpreted how to play or what the gist of the ticket was.  Mom has no such excuse.

She asks me to get my ticket and then proceeds to tell me that on the back is an extra game and it is there that she believes she hit the jackpot.  It's set up like a slot machine and you match oranges or cherries, etc.  Or if you have a dollar sign, one of these $, you win the amount shown.  She says she has a dollar sign and the prize amount shown is $150,000.  "Are you sure?" I say several times.  She assures me that is what she has.  I had a dollar sign on my ticket, with a prize of $3 so I told her I would go cash it in and ask some questions then get back to her.  So she waits on pins and needles and I go to the grocery store and chat up the lottery counter lady.  She assures me that if mom does indeed have the dollar sign and the $150,000 prize listed, then she is a winner and she tells me how we go about redeeming the ticket.

Leaving the store, I call mom and tell her the good news.   It looks like she's a winner!   I am working that day so I told her I would finish up my job and then come over and we'll get the redemption process underway.  She's excited.  I'm excited and start planning my trip to Italy!   I go home on Cloud 9 thinking about all my exciting plans that can finally come to fruition.  And as I'm just finishing up my job, she calls and says, "I don't think I won."  So I say, "What changed?  You either have the dollar sign or you don't."  Mom informs me that she's looked at it again and again and now it's looking more like an icon of an actual dollar than a dollar sign.  Big diff there mom.  The plane that was taking off for Sicily in my head just turned back around and landed in Akron and threw me off.  So I tell her, hold onto the ticket and when I come for my regular weekly visit, I'll look at it.  So that is where we leave it for the next couple days.

Wednesday rolls around, Wednesday traditionally being Mom day, and I head over.  When I get there I ask right away to see the ticket.  What I saw was not a dollar sign, nor was it a dollar icon.  It was an unscratched area.   Mom hates to wear her glasses.  I don't know why this is, but she does.  It's a constant battle every week with me yelling at her to put on her damn glasses so she can actually see what she's buying.  It's pretty much a given to me at this point that she did not have her glasses on when she attempted to scratch off this ticket and basically missed the whole area except for one tiny little corner.  You could not tell what was under there, it was hardly scratched off at all.  So how she thought it was a dollar sign, a dollar icon or anything else for that matter is beyond me.  I am trying to keep my cool but my fury is starting to take over.  She had me running to stores to find out how to cash this non ticket in, a ticket that wasn't mistaken for a winner, she never scratched the fucking thing!   So I scratch it, and it's not a dollar sign.  It's not a dollar symbol.  It's a fucking orange!!!   Not even close to either thing she thought it was. 

Do you think this convinced her that she should wear her glasses when she's trying to read something?  It hasn't!  It's still an on going weekly battle. Oy give me strength.

Did She Really Say That?

Grandma was about 89 at the time.  She was living in the house she had lived in for well over 50 years.  The small bungalow that I have so many joyous memories of.  The tiny house with two kitchens.  It is a prerequisite if you're Italian to have two kitchens, the main one and a second one in the basement.  We do a lot of cooking.

On this particular visit, I was hanging out with Grandma after work and she had, of course, made me some fucking delicious dinner.  I don't remember what it was, but I know it was great because it was always great.  After we ate, we went into the living room to have espresso and talk.  She started to tell me about my cousin T and his wife G.  Gina was very pregnant with their first and they had come by for a visit a few days before.  Grandma was really put off because G was wearing a rather short skirt for someone in her condition.  G's also a big freakin whore, so you know, a miniskirt at 8 months pregnant isn't a big shocker.   It wasn't to me anyway.  But this was not something Grandma was down with.  She was disgusted by it in fact.  So disgusted that she said these words to me, "And there she was, sitting on my sofa with her legs spread and her pussy hanging out."  And I choked on my espresso!

It's not that I wasn't used to Grandma using colorful language.  Good Lord she could cuss with the best of them when she wanted to!   Hmmm... there's another thing I have in common with her.  But to hear an 89 year old woman saying "pussy," there was just something very hilarious and unsettling about it at the same time.   God love her.  I sure do.

Two Years

It was two years ago today that I lost one of the most important people in my life, my Grandma Angelina.  She was only three weeks away from her 100th birthday but I don't think you would ever have known that by looking at her.  She had gotten ill in February of '08, suffering a perforated bowel, a complication for diverticulitis.  She was rushed to the hospital in the wee hours of the morning and had emergency surgery.  Perforated bowel is pretty serious, in anyone, and she was 99 at the time.  Many don't survive it.  She did.  But it's not a surprise really.  This is the same woman, who at 90 years old, had a triple bypass and valve replacement, earning her a spot in medical journals for not only undergoing that intense of a surgery at her age, but surviving and thriving. It was a stroke she suffered a few months after the perforated bowel, in September that ultimately claimed her.  And even when she couldn't talk and couldn't move one side of her body, I still thought maybe she would pull through.  She always did before, why not this time too?

She came to the United States from Palermo in April of 1909 when she was just a baby.  She arrived at Ellis Island on the ship called Columbia.  This is a picture of the actual ship she was on.

I want to share her with you.  I want you to know her, see her.  This is a family portrait taken in 1925.  Everyone in this photo (except for the 3 adults who are seated) are siblings of my Grandmother's.  In the front from left to right are Theresa, Lucia, the baby is Charles, and on the end, Nick.  Behind Theresa is Biago, then my great Grandparents, my Grandfather (Salvatore) and then Caroline.  Standing in the back is Carmella and Angelina.  My Grandfather is included because he was married to Angelina by this time.  An arranged marriage where he was about 14 years older than she was. 

Married at 15, a mother at 16 and so far ahead of her time.   She always worked, whether it be in a factory, in a beverage store, in a Chicken Delight (a place my uncle owned, kind of a competition of KFC some 40 years ago), a pizza place or any other number of restaurants she cooked in.  When she worked at my uncle's Chicken Delight, she got so sick of chicken she rarely ever ate it in her later years.  But she wasn't the chicken fryer there.  No, what she made was her amazingly delicious pizza.   I don't remember much about the place, but I always remember her pizza.  There is no better.  

To me, she was always larger than life, even though she was only about 4 ft. 5 inches tall.  She was fierce.  That is probably the best word I could use to describe her.  Fierce in every way.  I hardly knew my Grandfather, he died when I was seven years old and I was always just a little afraid of him.  I knew him sick, and I knew him with a very heavy Italian accent.  But I never really spent a lot of time with him.  It's kind of funny but when you think of Italian women, especially old country Italian women, you probably think of little short stocky women, wearing black dresses and a veil on their heads, carrying a rosary and a church book or bible.  This was not my Angelina.  My Grandfather was a church goer so my Grandma would drive him to the door of the church and then leave.  Then she would come back an hour later to pick him up.  I never knew why she didn't go in but now I wish I had thought to ask her.  It wasn't something I ever really thought about though.  She just didn't go.  And relate to that.  As soon as I was old enough to make my own decisions about whether or not to go to church, I stopped going.  But she believed in God.  Whenever I talked to her she told me she thanked the Lord a hundred times a day that she was still alive, still sharp, still able to do things for herself.  She had some, but not a lot, of religious symbolism in her house.  A cross here, a statue of Mary there.  And she never, ever ate meat on any Friday all year long.

Writing about her is difficult.  I can guess that reading it probably is too.  I feel like I'm all over the map and not making sense.  If that's what's happening, I hope you can bear with me and understand how hard it is.  She is someone I miss every day of my life.   I want to tell you about her humor.  I want to tell you funny stories.  I want to tell you about how much she taught me, not just in the kitchen but about the kind of woman I want to be.  I want to tell you about her food.  I want to tell you what holidays were like at her house.   But I realize with so much to say about her, that this particular entry will have to be a to be continued kind of thing.  So for now I'll leave you with the knowledge that she was someone I loved intensely, admired greatly, and miss painfully.

A Love Letter to Angelina

It's coming up on two years since I lost my Grandma.  I think of her so often, especially at times when I feel lost.  She was someone who always had my back.  She never judged.  She never criticized.  She listened with care, love and concern.  I could tell her anything.  And even more amazing, she could relate to just about any situation I found myself in, even with our 57 year age difference.  She had a calming influence and an easy way about her.  I doubt she would believe that about herself, but it's absolutely true.

She never questioned any of my rebellious activities.   She always told me I was beautiful even when I showed up to Thanksgiving dinner with a big black mohawk, torn fishnets and got totally hammered on the carafe's of Chablis she had on the table (which I called giraffe's of chab bliss as I got more and more drunk).  Back then food wasn't as important to me as drink.  Lots and lots of drink.  Looking back I want to smack my 22 year old self and tell me to pay fucking attention and enjoy the hell out of Grandma's food whenever I was given the opportunity. 

But now I make her perfect crust and amazing sauce whenever I make pizza.  I make her delicious sauce for spaghetti.   I make her insane cutlets.  I make her pies.  I make her breads.  I make her sausage.  I make her Easter cookies.  I use her 60 year old Kitchen Aid stand mixer.  Nothing ever tastes quite the same as when she made them, but whenever I make something of hers or use that mixer, I think even more of that beautiful soul I was so lucky to have in my life until I was 42 years old.  Is it ever enough time?

i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate,my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

ee cummings