SPRING (Primavera) Or, “’APPY EAST”…or HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

as my relatives from Italy used to say every Easter Sunday. Boy, how I miss seeing and hearing them.

Today is baby sister Joanne’s birthday! She just turn 49, and sure looks it! HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOANNE!

Actually, 49 is pretty young, and she is pretty, so… she looks just like me; pretty and young. Watch your mouths out there.

Back in 1955, we spent our last Easter Sunday (Pasqua) in Brooklyn. I had three sisters at the time and one was only about 5 months old. It was the last time we ever had the holiday where we dressed up. In subsequent years, after we moved to Long Island, life became more casual, and less church centered.

In those Brooklyn days, we would all gather at Grandma’s house, family from Patchogue would meet with family from Coney Island, and we would all feast to our hearts content.

The day started off by going to church, a church that was big and stuffy, filled with worshippers of all ages. We would walk home, smelling the foods that were being prepared for that special Sunday. Easter is an especially important holiday if you were Italian, ranking right up there with Christmas Eve, and ahead of Christmas and Thanksgiving.

After breakfast of coffee and cakes, rolls and buns, we went off to Grandma’s, anticipating seeing cousins from the Islands, both Coney and Long. The funny thing is Brooklyn is part of Long Island, and Coney Island is part of Brooklyn.

Grandma would have two very long tables, laid out end-to-end, for four or five-dozen people to sit, all at once and eat dinner. This dinner was as long as her tables, and the food was never endingly delicious. These meals would start about 1pm and end around 9:30 pm! The wine flowed like water, and the conversation went uninterrupted. Three languages were spoken: English, Italian and Handlish, a language that accompanied both English and Italian, with the hands, no words. This language needed both hands, and you had to be poetic in its usage.

But the thing that made it particularly special was the endless stream of visitors. Grandma was like a Godfather, except that she was the Godmother. If someone was having trouble in the community, they came to her and she helped them out. If someone was in need of money or assistance, front and center she stood. She was also a pillar of her church, Our lady of Loretto, where she organized bus trips to upstate New York, and other pilgrimages to Italy, where incidentally, they named a building for orphans after her in Naples.

One year, after many years of feeding her children, my grandmother said “Basta” (enough) and my aunt invited everyone to her house in Patchogue for Easter. Dad was elected to go to Brooklyn and pick Grandma up. Dad and I left that Saturday morning and got to my aunts house in Coney Island, where Grandma was now living, since my grandfather passed away. Mid-morning arrivals mean longer Italian lunches to my Grandmother. By 2:30 pm, I could hardly move, and the last thing I wanted was to eat the next day. (How quickly I forgot that!)

When it was time to leave for home, not only Grandma was coming, but two gallons of home-made wine, and two large shopping bags of cold meats, cheeses and breads, This was on top of gifts or presents that she had lined up for upcoming birthdays. Usually, when you saw Grandma, she would be stuffing your pockets with money, and pinching your checks with her incredibly delicious smelling fingers, from the meal she had just prepared for you. She would ask a question, marvel at “How bigga” you got, and then give a little girl laugh, a “tee-hee”.

She was a grand old lady, with a life filled with courage, dignity pain and suffering. She saw the best and the worst in people, but never ever turned anyone away.

She died on Christmas Eve, the one holiday she was always ready for, and expected to see you there at her table. Rest well grandma, you deserve to.

Wish you could say “Basta” to this blog? Then get off your duff and write to: joedelbroccolo@yahoo.com. Tell him: Ima so sicka hue. No salesman will call.