This weekend E and I watched The Godfather. He had seen it before, but it was a first for me. I knew about the horse head in bed, the bouquet of fish, and the tollbooth scene. And everyone looked so young they didn't look like themselves (especially Keaton and Pacino). But that's not what really struck me about the movie.
What struck me about the movie was the culture and the family and the position of the family. Yes, I know, The Godfather movies have probably done more harm to the good name of Italians everywhere than anything else. It's propelled stereotypes and burned them into society's mind. Even if I have cousins with the dark hair and dark circles under their eyes and always wear dark suits. But even that isn't what I mean.
At one point I turned to E (I think during one of the wedding scenes) and said "do you ever feel like you are a bad Italian?" I know that my father's family used to be close. I know all my great aunts and uncles and all the cousins were always over everyone's house all the time. I know there was homemade pasta and other glorious food (along with the "what's wrong with you that you don't want a third helping, I made it just for you," thank you Aunt Jo). I know that Great-Grandmother Chiara used to put curses in Italian on people.
But that's not the family that I grew up with. I saw bits and pieces of it as a child. And I can see it in the photographs that my Nana has. But my brother and I never had birthday parties where it was just family invited (and that meant at least 30 people). The big dinner on Sunday was just the four of us. No one sang in Italian when I got married. I only know a few words of Italian, and I'm not even sure that it's really Italian and not just the warped pronouncation of my aging grandmother.
Part of it was that we moved away - to Colorado, to Newtown (oh so far away from Stamford - a whole 45 minutes!) Part of it was I think my mother was not comfortable with that side of the family. Part of it was that the speed of life changed. Everyone got so wound up in their lives that the only time we saw each other was at funerals.
There's no one alive now that remembers "the old country." Cousins are scattered all over the country. It makes me sad. There is a rich history there that I feel I have missed out on. I wish I knew Great Grandmother Chiara's curses. I wish I knew how to make Nana's "gravy" (aka, marinara sauce).
Living out in CA I'm separated from The Family. I think there is a distant cousin or two out here in the Bay area, but I've never met them. I know there's one in LA. When I go home to CT all my time is spent seeing my brother and mother. The 45-minutes to Stamford is too far. And that makes me sad. The work I've done on the family geneology is a way to try to grasp and hold on to it. But it's just fleeting moments, names on paper. The real, living people are lost to me. And I don't know how to get them back.
