PAVLOV’S DOG HAS NOTHING ON ME!

The morning drew to a close. As I get up from the dining room floor, my army ready for another pitch battle, I looked for Mom. She was busy finishing up the mopping of the tiled kitchen floor, and was picking up the newspapers she had are carefully laid down.

On a spring day, particularly when the weather was beautiful, she would open all the windows and help the floor dry. Mom would sing to her self as she mopped, or worked around the house. All the old songs from when she was a child, and heard them from the radio, Mom would pass them along to my sisters and me.

As the morning ended, one could hear the distant sound of the ‘Angelis’ the bell ringing that occurred every day at noon. You could look out the kitchen window, across the back yards toward Aberdeen Street, and see the bell tower, in it’s Gothic like magnificence and it slowly and mournfully tolled.

That was a trigger!

When I heard the welcomed sound of the bells, my stomach would begin to make noises that seemed to keep pace with the bell. In my ‘dungarees and stripped shirt, I would look down at my stomach and say: “I know, I hope it’s a bologna sandwich.”

My mouth salivating, just like a dog, I waited near the table and watched as she took out the Wonder Bread or Silvercup Bread or God help me, the Italian bread. Some days it was peppers and eggs, some days make believe cutlets, (a poor man’s version of veal or chicken cutlets without the meat. Just Eggs, cheese and breadcrumbs, mixed and sautéed.) Sometimes, she would reach in the frig, and make a potato and eggs sandwich! I was at a restaurant once in Port Washington, and the menu offered it, and I paid over $7 for it! The all had the welcome smell of cheese or peppers that permeated throughout the 5-room apartment on Hull Street in Brooklyn.

Whatever Mom made was heaven sent! Mom, loved to eat, and did we all, but only Mom and my Grandmother really knew how to bring it to the table.

It seemed the spring days that one could feel the warmth of the sunshine and its brightness, causes me to remember other moments in my past. Days that trigger good memories are vignettes of sweet recall.

Please remember My Man Bill, and my Brother-in-law, John, and all those that need our hopes and prayers.