Metamorphosis: n.
a change of the form or nature of a thing or person into a completely different one, by natural or supernatural means.
Yesterday, my dad turned 92. I know, I know, how could a 92 year old man have a daughter as young as I? lol
In 1962, six years after he immigrated to Canada, my father set off once again for his homeland, to see what the economic situation was like in Italy, and to see if he could re-create a life for our family there. Not many people who know us, know that he was that serious about it. Life was tough for new immigrants coming to ‘America’ after WW2. My mother has told me often that if she had had the money to go back, she would have turned around the day she arrived.
That summer, he returned to Isernia, region of Molise; a town nestled in the Appenine valley, located about 150km inland, and south-east of Rome. His purpose, to visit his family, to see his father (which would be the last time), to catch up with friends, and to check out life, once again, back home. Upon his return to Canada, he approached my mother and said, “L’Italia non e piu per noi“.
Translated: “Italy is not for us anymore”.
For anyone who has made another country their permanent home, I think they may understand what he would have been talking about: When we leave our country of origin and are absent for some time, the place, the people, and the images are frozen in time. Yet, life back “home”, goes on. When we return, we are caught off-guard when things seem changed.
There is a film on Netflix, called “The Bicycle Thief”.
It’s a neorealistic depiction of life in post-war Rome, set in 1948. I would recommend you see it, especially if older movies interest you. It’s subtitled, so don’t be disappointed. For some, it may seem slow-moving, but there is depth in the setting, people, and plot. There is also contradiction in the visuals: Buildings old and new. It was voted one of the best movies of its time. It explained to me, how my parents may have been shaped by that era, and what the situation in Europe was like, that it precipitated many to leave, and look for work abroad.
In any case, when he returned to Canada, he and my mother recommitted to life here, and they seriously started looking to purchase a home, and expand their family. My father was in his forties when he became a ‘daddy’ again. I have extremely fond memories of my childhood and of life with my dad. Some things that stick out in my mind were all the home projects he did. I don’t think he realized how much he was being ‘watched’, and how much we all learned from him.
My father was extremely ingenious, and somewhat eccentric. He still is, however, his loss of eyesight limits his current abilities. Our family is very “technical” and “crafty”; a big part of this comes from the passing down of the “ingenuity” gene, in my opinion. He was constantly building his own machines to perform various ‘necessary’ tasks – like diamond-tipped marble cutters. I say ‘necessary’ because everyone who builds a marble staircase, leading to the basement, needs a marble cutter.
I also recall him building a copper-pipe irrigation system, to water bedding plants and hanging baskets, that doubled as a beautiful climbing-rose pergola, complete with hand crafted copper leaves.
Then of course, the greenhouse he built, with “automated retractable roof”. At precisely 74deg F the roof would open. The project was by trial and error, for when the temperature fluctuated between 73 and 75 degrees, on a given day, the roof would cycle between ‘open’ and ‘closed’, so he had to install a limit switch to stop this from happening. I used to joke that dad beat the designers of the skydome by five years!
I sometimes feel sorry for him because he can’t use a computer or see a TV as before. He was always ahead of the curve technology-wise. He was an early-adopter of technology, who has lost the ability to experience the full-potential of the internet. I know he would have loved it. He enjoys it when people help to tune him in, by being his eyes, and ears on the net.
One of the best memories I have of my dad, takes place around 1970. It was a beautiful late summer morning. The stonecrop was in full bloom, and my father was outside tending his roses and cutting the grass. There were about 50 Monarch butterflies in our garden that morning. My friends and I (about five of us) were playing out on the sidewalk, when my dad asked me to run in the house and get a spool of thread from my mother. I returned with the thread and he asked me to watch the Monarchs land on the stonecrop blooms.
He showed me how to pick them up carefully by the wings, while he slipped a noose of a length of a few feet of thread, loosely around the butterfly’s body. He gently tightened the knot, and released the butterfly so that it was free to fly on the end of the thread. We ended up releasing them for those who wish to know, however, It was quite a sight to see…five children walking down the sidewalk with our Monarch butterflies on a string.
We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty. – Maya Angelou