REMINISCES OF FAMILY

Reversing the pattern, some posts from FB, to be expanded or not later.

CHICAGO = My reminiscence of a wonderful week there will have to wait; better to search my blog because I think I wrote about it before. My first speaking engagement outside the Region here little did I know would lead to so much controversy and be just the start of my own nationwide tour swelling my head like a mini-diva for a good cause speaking on behalf of the office on HIV-related and other forms of discrimination prohibited by Federal law, just being allowed to appear and speak publicly a victory after a long fought internal struggle in the office. Hometown of my Italian mother, 2 generations from Naples. Friendliest people and gay bars anywhere (outside a small town).. Gorgeous tulips in bloom everywhere, recently found my photos I need to organize and collate digitally at last. And to prove you can't tell this B no, an uneventful sojourn on the L to the far south side to Mom's old neighborhood, something and Wood? I'll look it up, Mother told me not to go, the sweet Polish couple at the tourist store who used to live nearby told me not to go, everyone of every color at OCR told me not to go, of course i went, 2 stops from downtown no other white people on the train, had to bite my grin off my face from the discreet looks saying when that crazy white boy getting off the train. So finally past more housing projects I have ever seen, an old neighborhood of big houses and wide streets appears and I get to my stop. Her house was blocks away, the blocks were long, like LA no one was walking. So i stood on the platform took some photos, Mom recognized the billboard and corner store (or so she said) I declared victory and waited for the next train back downtown without leaving the platform. Mission accomplished. It was a wonderful week.

Mom graduated Harper High School, 6520 S. Wood St. Chicago, that's what i wanted to document in family blog post, lived south of there Marquette sounds familiar, got it somewhere want to document below, Grandma pushing vegetable cart through Italian neighborhood in the 1920s; we all immigrants except the native indigenous, although not all of us arrived willingly, we all here now. 

Sometimes a partial victory just as good, same feeling when in kindergarten catechism after months of pestering, i wore them down and they said sure nonCatholics might be able to go to heaven if they really good, but they would have to go to purgatory first. My first civil rights victory. Much older, hearing Mom whisper to Dad you gotta say something did you hear what he said the way he talks to me - how many times i told him the same thing in reverse - and Dad's reply -same as it was to me = you 2 work it out I'm not getting involved you 2 exactly alike. A little validation goes a long way and I'll back off satisfied. Longer versions of those anecdotes elsewhere. Hadn't planned on writing about family again, but pleased I am finding a less negative perspective again.

50, well i was going to post an anecdote but first it wasn't 50 years ago, or 40 just to make that clear but sometime ago, on one of my first visits home during a break from attending UC Berkeley, I had been picketing Safeway during the grape boycott. I opened the fridge, the first thing one does when visiting, and I found a shelf full of grapes. I immediately disposed of them of course. The next day, while sensing mom in the next room, I opened the fridge - and found twice as many grapes as the day before. Closing the door I heard the well timed clicking of her heels entering the kitchen. As she opened the back door to go to her car she turned and said, and if those are gone when I return I'll get even more. Fearful of being blamed for ruining the boycott when the union discovered Mom's store the source of skyrocketing sales, I acknowledged defeat and never disposed of or ate another grape again. Never mess with an Italian mama - her kitchen is her kingdom!

http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-0927-delano-strike-20150927-story.html 


And now for my father's side of the family, and a remembrance of Aunt Nelly and so much more, to be expanded perhaps, or more likely not reading back i see that was way more than enough or intended. Likes permitted, questions likely not to be answered. You'll see what i mean when you get there but this indicates I reviewed and edited this. My Dad's favorite sister and the only one he didn't stop talking to after the others shunned my Catholic mother in a post wedding visit to his hometown Saginaw. His father was Welsh but his mother French Canadian Indian and Catholic who ran a "boarding house". I think there was an earlier wife who died and was mother to some siblings. Whatever my Dad the only one who converted from Methodist to Catholic apparently before meeting my Italian mother. Nelly loved antiques, owned a shop, and gardening. I noted below her and Uncle Bunny's notorious RV trips. Didn't see them much have lots of cousins I don't know from the other siblings. Nelly and Bunny had 2 sons, one is a Buddhist i think or is he Hindu explored every religion who knows where he is last i heard Sedona, Johnny an avid businessman in Idaho owns laundry, flooring who knows what else, you get the picture total opposites. But what I am trying to get to is Nelly's visit to CA and her and my Dad's visit to me in SF. After WWII he (Bunny) was stationed at Presidio in SF and they had a duplex apt in what is now the Haight. I lived in the Haight and loved it, shared an apt overlooking GG Park with he who brought me to see Diana in Tahoe; one April we marveled at snow falling over the park. Then my own solo apt. Well after visiting the Dahlia garden in GG Park which she went gaga over, for good reason, we had to drive by to see the place. Ok. Well then we had to stop in front. OK. Then I noticed her hand on the door handle and me and Dad exchanged furious glances. Yep before we could move she was out the door "I'll just knock and see if anyone's home." Nelly was a little firecracker and you didn't mess with Nelly. OMG this was the Haight and it wasn't all peace and flowers at the time. The door opens slightly, but not enough to see who answered, In goes Nelly and the door shuts behind her. OMG We jumped out of the car and tried to wait before knocking. But soon the door opened and we were invited in. Turned out to be a retired social worker from Alameda County (Oakland) who had just returned from a long dreamed of vacation in Africa. Lots of mementos and we saw the yard where my cousins played as infants. My Dad visited and stayed there after high school. He would take walks to smoke cigs to GG Park and downtown and the rest I may never blog about. Suffice it to say when I came out to my mother, at her urging, and she kept urging me to tell my father, who I wasn't comfortable with at the time, she said, "haven't you ever heard of latent" i didn't think she even knew what the word meant and was forever speechless on the subject. But over the years circumstances reminded me of that from time to time. Eventually he met and married my Mom whose family had relocated from Chicago. His friend at the office was dating Mom's cousin so she went along to a company picnic - hell it was the whole weekend - to Catalina Island. All the guys went gaga over my beautiful mother. She never drank, hated it, family reasons. The others present recounted at a reunion a few years ago by the end of one evening my mother had a dozen drinks all untouched lined up in front of her and my Dad eventually passed out on the lawn. Well i recovered nicely i think from the tawdry fork in the road not taken. The END