No matter how hard he worked,  he made it home for the important family gatherings on Saturdays or Sundays.  He made sure he was on time.  Italians had many opportunities in America, but my family, and many of our Italian friends were skilled laborers, such as stone masons, carpenters,foremen, painters, brick layers, bakers, bakery or restaurant / pizzeria owners, chefs, plumbers, electricians, and other skilled laborers. My father originally belonged to a union when he started to work for a construction company in America, but the union contract would not allow my father to work on weekends. My father, especially as a stone mason, really needed to work all week, even on weekends. When you start to read about the quantities of food we ate at our house, you will understand why!
 
My father left the union and decided to start his own business. The Italians that I knew did not always work the 9-5 jobs. I was never embarassed of my parents, and will always be proud of their work. ( Okay, maybe sometimes I was a little embarassed of the rusty, dented pick up truck when my dad drove me to school).  But, I loved my papa, and all the things he represented in my life.
I loved the summer time. Think back to how much fun summer was when you were a kid.....As an adult, summer is still fun, but the Italian American summers as a kid, well, nothing can beat that! It was quite an experience for me.

 

My summer afternoons on Sundays usually started with these words from my mother: "dove siete? la pasta può ottenere freddo". I can speak Italian, but it is not perfect.  It means, "where are you? the pasta is getting cold".

 

Well, an Italian-American summer, even at a picnic or barbecue, still meant baked ziti, drenched with  marinara sauce, topped with reggiano cheese!  Sometimes, I longed for the cold, fresh taste of Hellman's mayonnaise on my pasta, with thinly sliced carrots and celery, just like the kind my American friends had at their house!  At my house, it was baked ziti, and even on a hot, summer day of 85 degrees, my mother still worried about the food getting cold.  My cousins and I would quickly run to the table when we heard, "dove siete?" coming from my mother's mouth.  My neighbors and friends all had dinner bells that they rang from the deck of their porch, or they would quietly go to search for their children when dinner was ready.

 

At our Italian house, we did not have a dinner bell.  The only bell we heard as Italians were the bells at St. Margaret's Shrine in Bridgeport, or at St. Teresa's church in Trumbull.  We had more civilized ways of being called to dinner, with my mother screaming at the top of her lungs,..."dove siete???" That was our hint to ride our bicycles back to our yard, or run to the picnic or dinner table.  Follow me over to the summer picnic table. You will be amazed at what you will see...as you walk with me, do not step on or ride your bike on top of my mother's flowers or mint leaf garden.  It was one of the first things out of her mouth when my cousins or friends would head back to the house. "attento dei fiori! non cammini in cima ai miei fogli di menta!" Oh, how this phrase echoes in my mind, even now! This means, "careful of my flowers, and do not walk on top of my mint leaves". My mama never had a large garden of mint leaves. It was just a small section near our garage. She was proud of those mint leaves, and if you stepped on them, well, you better run! Just as my mama finished saying it in Italian, one of my friends who did not know a word of Italian, would look at me and say, "huh? what is she saying?"...Just as my friend looked at me, the tire of her bicycle would be right on top of the flowers, and on to the mint leaves! The poor kid, how was she supposed to know what my mother meant?

 

The thing about being an Italian-American is you have to do "double-talk", which can be very exhausting.  This means, your parents say something in Italian, and your friends look at you like a deer in the headlights and say, "what?  huh? what is she saying?" The story of my life was to translate everything so my American friends could understand what my mother was yelling about!

 

The Italian-American summer meant that you had to have a white and red checkered table cloth. Back then, you could find one at Caldor's. Italians loved Caldor's or Bradlees.  If not, there was always a hand made one that my mother ( or from now on, mama) sewed herself.

 

The tablecloth was always linen, and neatly ironed. Imagine, linen on a summer day!  I do not know why my mama made extra work for herself on Sundays. The American tablecloths were vinyl or plastic. Mama would never think of a plastic or vinyl tablecloth. As I think of it, no one in my family owned one back then. Italians knew what vinyl was, but they thought it was for siding on the house, not a tablecloth!

 

During the summer, the Italian-American never saw their parents use a buffet table.  We had a table that was long enough to seat about 50 people, and put all of the food on!. The secret was that we attached about 4 tables. The tables were right next to each other, to make one continuous table.

 

The Italians that I knew did not beleive in sitting at separate tables. We all had to sit together, and that was it! No questions asked. We did not go to buy one that was large enough. We used whatever we had in the garage or basement. In my  Italian house, I remembered my father using cement blocks to raise the height of the table. If one table was shorter that the other, we used cardboard or cement blocks so all of the tables connected were exactly the same height.  There was not any other house on the block that had such a long picnic table, nor did anyone use such creativity as to use cardboard or cement blocks underneath.

One of my sisters always managed to make us Kool-Aid. We had bright red mustaches all day long. I do not know how my parents approved of Kool-aid. I think it was considered contraband in an Italian house. Somehow, she smuggled it in and made us some. I have alot of sisters, so I can't remember who made it.

 

Now, take a walk to your seat at the table, but do not sit in the Matriarch or Patriarch's chair!  Those were the only assigned seats at the table. Mama sat at the end of the table that was closest to the kitchen or dining room door. As an Italian-American, I was able to understand that mama sat at the end of the table nearest are kitchen or dining room door, just in case she had to go back into the kitchen for more food or beverage. So, please do not take her seat at the table! Otherwise, as I often heard on those hot, summer days, "alzi. ci è una sedia là". Mama's face grew a little red if you took her seat. The Italian phrase means, "Get up. There is another chair over there".

 

My father sat in the Patriarch chair. It was a chair like no other chair. The Patriarch sat in the most comfortable chair, and the home-made wine had to be right in front of him, within arm's reach. Every summer, no matter what the occasion, my mama said those common words to my papa, "Tu  prendere un bagno e cambiare i vostri vestiti prima che mangiamo?" This phrase meant, "are you going to take a shower and change your clothes before dinner?". It was always the same line, no matter what the occasion. My American friends or friends of other nationalities would never dream of sitting at the dinner table with cement on their shoes and shirt, sweat on their face, and a dirty work shirt.

 

My father was a clean man, and well groomed, but I remember that in the summer, as he worked more hours as a stone mason, he did not always shower before company arrived. My father's answer would be, "no".  No matter how many words my mother used, my father used only one, "no". That was the end of that question. My mother could ask all she wanted, but to my father, summer was a time of relaxation...All he would say was, "no" with a firm voice, and somehow the topic was dropped..

 

Are you hungry yet? I am sure you are curious about the Sunday food during the summer picnics in our Italian house. 

There was always a fruit bowl in the center of the table, filled with melon, strawberries, purple and white grapes, cherries, and ....take a look...dried figs.  My parents always had dried figs.  My American friends were scared when they saw the dried figs. Dried figs are usually a light brown color, and look a bit wrinkled.  My friends had asked me, "why do your parents have wrotten fruit?" I had to explain that it was dried fig. It took me about 1/2  hour to chew a dried fig, and I needed a lot of soda to wash it down my throat."

 

Next to the fruit bowl, we had Italian potato salad. Now, do not look for the mayonnaise in the potato salad, and we did not use paprika.  The Italian potato salad at my house looked like this: boiled, slices, white potatoes without the skin, extra virgin olive oil mixed in with the potatoes, black pepper, and tiny pieces of garlic. What else is in it? The mint leaves...the sacred mint leaves that my friends always ran over with their bikes!

 

The baked ziti was in it's usual spot, right next to the potato salad. We did not have low carb diets at our house, and no one used a measuring cup to measure their portions. Not at our house!

What is that you hear? It is probably Mario Lanza, or maybe my parent's friend Tony, who often sang at weddings and birthdays. Growing up in an Italian-American family meant having your parents friends insisting on singing at the Sunday gatherings.  It often echoed up our street and probably about 2 miles away! My parents loved songs from Naples, so their friend Tony would sing them right in our yard.  My American friends really wanted to hear singers like Donny Osmond, but it was traditional Italian songs only.

 

Then, there it was, with a glow of light all around it!  I think I heard a choir of angels sing....what was it?  The large, ceramic bowl, big enough for all 200 meatballs! If there were 50 people there, they all needed to have at least 4 a piece. Now that I think of it, even if only 10 people came to dinner, my mother still would cook 200  meatballs. Do not worry, you can "portigli a casa . potete mangiarli prima che andiate dormire". This meant, at all of our family gatherings, especially in the summer, "bring some home with you. You can eat some before you go to sleep". Now, I am thinking, mama must have extra elastic bands in the house to add to everyone's pants that night. Not only were we consuming 4 or 5 meatballs a piece during the picnic, but everyone was going to eat more before bedtime later!! I guess we never worried about that stuff before. It is no wonder I had a hard time waking up early the next day. Those meatballs were embedded into my stomach for days!

Are you full yet? well it does not matter.  There is more.  Next to the meatballs,  you will find chicken cutlets, drenched in egg, olive oil and bread crumbs. My mother had a plate that was as big as a flying saucer. There it was.....the big round, ceramic plate!  It really looked like something from that show, "Lost in Space". It was huge! My friends and relatives would put it neatly in the grinder rolls, or just pick it up with their fork, put it on their plate, and, yes, eat it with their hands!!  That was how it was.

We did have hamburgers, too. My mother would broil them inside the house because we did not have a grill.  My friends would make their way over to the giant, thick hamburgers and neatly sliced onions, lettuce and tomatoes. Now, take a look...they were not ordinary tomatoes. They were grown in my Uncle Rolando, or other relatives garden. Juicy, red, hand grown with much love. So, go a head, take a nice, big thick one!

My mother always forgot the ketchup. I am not sure why, but she forgot it. She would always run back into the house for the ketchup. It was always the local store brand. My mother was a frugal shopper when it came to that kind of stuff. We did not always have Heinz.

Our hot dogs were the extra long ones. I have no idea where my mother bought these hot dogs, and today, she still does not remember where.  These hot dogs were so long, you could cut them in half, and make 2 hotdogs out of them. That is what he had to do because it never fit on one of the buns. You had to slice it in half. Everything seemed longer or bigger at our Italian house.

If you are still not stuffed with the chicken cutlets, meatballs, ziti, jumbo hot dogs, hamburgers, and potato salad, well, there is more.  Have some provolone cheese!  It could be 100 degrees out, but my mother will bring out the provolone cheese and olives if you are still hungry. That is what she did.

As everyone sat around, my mother and aunts would clear the table.  We could not move!  Too much food! Some of my friends looked green! My uncle would lay on the lounge chair, with one button undone on his pants so his tummy could escape the tightness of the pants after our meals.  Usually, by now, the men in the family would have taken off their shirt, to reveal their gold chain necklaces. Sometimes, the white tank tops that Italians were so proud of, would be worn during the Summer gatherings.  We stayed outside in the shade. What else do I remember about Italian summers? ...

 

We never had such things as "central air conditioning". What was that? We finally had bought a fan by late July, but usually we laid on the hammock or lounge chairs in the shade.  The men would tell the women at the table to stop talking too much. You see, at our house, when it was hot and you were full, during the time of digestion you grew a little bit quieter for a few minutes. After the table was cleared, and just as you digested the food, there it was!  Another ray of light beaming in mama's path!  Stella Doro cookies, and Italian pastry! Cannoli and sfogliadelli pastry!  I think my mother thought that the cannoli and pastry helped to protect the lining of your stomach. My friends' parents would always send over a bundt cake, or coffee cake. No one really ate it though. Sure, we liked it, but we gorged ourselves with so much other food, that we never got to the bundt or coffee cake. Tomorrow is a new day, so that will be my afternoon snack. Every Sunday, I always knew what I would eat, even the next day. We heard a bell at a distance...what was the ringing? The good Humor Ice cream truck.  I would have a gleam in my eye, and every Sunday it was the same question! "Can I have an ice cream from the ice cream man?" I asked.  My Uncle or papa would say,"avete i buoni biscotti e pasticcerie qui! ho una scatola dello spumoni nella casa. " This meant, "we have good cookies and pastries here, and I have a box of Spumoni in the house." This meant, no good Humor ice cream today. Later in the summer, as my American friends caught on, they would come to my But I knew that Monday would be different. I was aloud to have Good Humor on Monday. So, it was easily forgotten. I knew exactly what kind of ice cream I would have on Monday. The Red, white and blue Bomb pops they were called. They looked like rockets, and it was perfect on a summer day. Monday would come soon. But, on Sunday, it was Spumoni and the other Italian treats. I loved the Italian food, but the American food was great, too.

Sometimes we listened to traditional songs from Naples, Italy, or my parents' friend, Tony would sing a song called "Piccolo Fiori" in our yard. Once in a while, someone brought an accordion. This guy could play the accordion like no one else!

Someone always wanted to play scoba.  Now, they took this game seriously in the summer time. I remember the Italian deck of cards with their brightly colored pictures and symbols. As a child, I thought, "wow, they must be brilliant to figure out what these pictures on the cards mean.". 

 

It was hot out, but the adults still wanted their hot, espresso coffee. It was always the same, about 50 cups of espresso. It was only Medaglio D'oro coffee back then. It was a sin to drink anything else. Sometimes my mama would make a pot of American coffee, too, just in case one the parents of  my American friends wanted some. Italians sometimes had Sanka in the house. My American friends had to be picked up by 8:00pm, even in the summer. They had to go to bed my 9pm. But, as for me and my Italian friends and family, we stayed up as late as we wanted to, wether it was Fall, Winter, Spring, or Summer.   Besides, I knew that there would be another meal later tonight. There would be leftovers, or maybe my mama would make a Fritatta. If you don't know what a fritatta is, do not worry, I will explain the deal about the Fritatta later on.

So, my American friends would say, "hey, where is the trophy for the winner of the scoba game?." I am thinking, "trophy, are they nuts?" We did not have trophies at our house. All it meant was winning with pride...something to brag about all week until they played scopa again next week. One of my friends said, "hey, look at how mad they get when they are losing, how much money are they playing for?"  I laughed and said, "money, do you think they play for money? They have mouths to feed ( and look at how much food they had to buy every week at places like Sorrento and Waldbaums.) Back then it was Waldbaums, then on to Sorrento,Pathmark, and Luigi's. Otherwise, it was a sin. Imagine? playing for money. My friends would say, "well my dad won a ton of money at poker, so we are going to the water park next weekend.". I am thinking, "water park, what is that?" As an Italian, I had no idea what a water park was. We sometimes got a new pair of shorts or a bathing suit at Alexander's at the Trumbull mall. We all loved it there. It was another place to congregate with other Italians. Sometimes, on a Sunday, we would move our festivities down to a beach called Seaside Park, in Bridgeport.

 

But, as far as a water park goes, as an Italian-American, I had an inflatable pool, large enough for my friends! Sometimes, we ran through the Sprinkler. That was our water park, papa's sprinkler, with the sound and feel of the squished, soggy grass on my feet.

My mother's carpet was sacred. At our Italian house, you had to wash your feet before walking on her living room carpet. We were not allowed to run into the house, because you might knock over her Roman statues in the living room, or knock the gold, plastic grapes out of her ornate vase from Italy!

 

The scopa game grew intense. Someone always ended up throwing the cards down on the table, and would say, "le mie carte sono maledette."This meant "my cards are cursed". Here we go again, every family gathering, someone saying their cards were cursed, or as we called it, "the maloccio". Then, after the yelling, it was all forgotten.

 

Those summers were so hot and muggy. I waited to hear those words from my papa. My papa smoked Lucky Strike cigarettes. I knew at exactly which time on a summer night he would need to go to Pathmark, the only 24 hour place back then, so papa could buy cigarettes. In the truck I would go with one or two of my cousins. Of course, we did not have room for the younger cousins, so someone would cry at the top of the driveway as we pulled away. The way the younger cousins would cry, you would think we were going to Coney Island, rather than getting cigarettes with papa! I sat in the back of the pick up truck. Oh, those summer memories of my Italian-American summer. Sometimes, at least one of my American friends convinced their parents to let them stay later, so she hopped into the pick up truck, too.

 

I remember putting my feet up on the bags of cement in the back of the pick up truck. How I loved waving my arms on the side of the truck as we drove down Main St. in Bridgeport. I did not care about air conditioning. The back of papa's pick up truck was good enough for all of us! One cousin would love to put her feet off the back of the truck, while the others would laugh and giggle. We thought we were so cool down on Main St. Somehow, the rust spots on papa's truck seemed invisible to us.

 

Papa would always buy us something when he took us inside of Pathmark to buy his cigarettes.  Maybe it would be a box of Marino's Italian Ice, the Ice blue or red kind! or maybe he would buy a gallon of more Spumoni! No matter what, that brown paper bag always meant happiness to me during the summer.

As we walked up our driveway when we returned home, we smelled food again!  Our neighbors' houses were dark, and not even a dog was barking. In our Italian house, especially in the summer, the garlic, zucchini and olive oil scent invaded the streets!

 

The party now moved from the back yard to the kitchen. My mama, looking tired, was still wearing her apron. It was permanently attached to every outfit. She was making the Fritatta.  A Fritatta is an omelette, which is the size of a UFO.  This UFO contained onions, zucchini, eggs, cheese, and a little bit of  flour. Sometimes she would add peppers. We stared at that pan as if we waiting for this UFO to take off and fly around the room!

 

"Wow! what is that?"The common summer food at our house was the frittata. Just in case you did not want the left overs, you can have some fritta.   I was always confused when my friends ate a plain scrambled egg. I would look at the plate and say, "what else are you going to put in that?" All summer long, I would be confused, never knowing why my American friends ate scrambled eggs, without anything in it! I remember the winter weekends at my ski house rental in Vermont. I felt guilty making a plain scrambled egg for my friends. I have searched so many menus at the restaurants in Vermont, but there is no sign of a fritatta. 

The perfect ending to our summer night was to watch my Aunts and Uncles dancing to Italian music. There was Mario Lanza again, or Claudio Villa. I still have the Claudio Villa album. That guy in the convertible on the cover! That was a necessity in our Italian house in the summer time!

 

We never used paper plates at our gatherings, so my mama and Aunts washed the dishes until 2am. We never worried about conserving water back then! They never asked the men to help. It is not if it is right or wrong, it is just how it was. The men and women had roles during the summer gatherings.

The women cooked, shopped and cleaned. The men played scoba, and put the outdoor furniture away.

No matter what, those summer memories will live on in my heart. There was always much love, and the grand finale was to watch the men and women dance together at the end of the night, as the rest of the neighborhood slept. Our Italian house was the only one on the block with all the lights on  and cars still in the driveway. Ahh, I had the best seat in the house, watching the men and women dance in the livingroom. It was the only time they were quiet and did not talk! 

As an adult, I find myself using linen tablecloths and cooking the same foods!. Things that I could not understand as a child, I find myself doing automatically! Claudio Villa, Mario Lanza, and Frank Sinatra always were part of our family gatherings. Maybe tonight, I will play that Claudio Villa album.