Dear Mom, I need your help to write about Great Grandma Clementina. I feel you in my heart today Mom and that’s the only reason that I am able to start this letter. Until today I was frozen inside every time I thought about your grandmother’s life sorrows.
Cara Mamma, ho bisogno del tuo aiuto per scrivere della Bisnonna Clementina. Ti sento nel mio cuore oggi Mamma e questa è l'unica ragione per cui sono iniziare questa lettera. Fino ad oggi ero congelato dentro ogni volta che pensavo ai dolori della vita di tua nonna.
Why am I writing in Italian? You and I never spoke the language together – a sad mistake on my part – but I grew up hearing you and Grandma Michelina and Grandpa Claude speak together. I lived with you in their house when I was an infant and then again months later while Dad was in school out of town. So I was very young when the language seeped into my soul.
Perchè sto scrivendo in italiano? Io e te non abbiamo mai parlato insieme della lingua –un triste errore da parte mia—ma sono cresciuto ascoltando te e la Nonna Michelina e il Nonno Claude parlare insieme. Ho vissuto con te nella loro casa quando ero un bambino e poi ancora mesi dopo, mentre papà era a scuola fuori città. Quindi ero molto giovane quando la lingua filtrava nella mia anima.
I was terrified when I first began to focus on Bisnonna Clementina, connecting her as I did to you and indirectly to my darling little granddaughter. But now I am ready to write about Great Grandma. One thing I realize: in all the years you spoke of your grandmother, there was never the least bit of hard feeling or resentment. Grandma Mish never spoke a single dark whisper against her mother!
Ero terrorizzato quando ho iniziato a concentrarmi sulla Nonna Clementina che la collegavo come ho fatto con te e indirettamente con la mia cara nipotina. Ma ora sono pronto a scrivere della nonna. Una cosa che realizzo: in tutti gli anni di cui hai parlato tua nonna, non c’è mai stata la minima dose di rancore or risentimento. Nonna Mish non ha mai pronunciato un solo sussuro oscuro contro sua madre!
All her life, my dear Grandma Mish kept the portraits of Clementina and her husband, Paolo Caponi, hanging on her bedroom wall! There was so much love in our family – so much love that it wrapped around and around and around the tragedies.
Per tutta la vita Mish ha tenuto i ritratti di Clementina and her husband, my Great Grandfather Paolo Caponi, appesi alla parete dell sua camera! Mary ha ragione quando dice che c’era così tanto amore che si è avvolto intorno e intorno e intorno le tragedie.
AND NOW I WILL SAY OUT LOUD THIS UNFORTUNATE BIT OF FAMILY HISTORY:
E ora dirò ad alta voce questo sfortunato pezzo di storia familiare:
Grandma Mish and Grandpa Claude had their first baby in January 1921. Dante grew to be a gorgeous baby, plump and full of love and joy, and even some blonde curls.
La nonna Mish e il nonno Claude hanno avulto il loro primo figlio nel Gennaio del 1921, quando Dante è cresciuto mi è stato detto un belissimo bambino grassoccio e pieno di amore e gioia e persino di alcuni riccioli biondi.
When Dante
was eight months old, in perfect health, he sat one day on my great grandmother Clementina’s lap and she told my Grandma Mish: “it would be a good idea to have the baby vaccinated. It will keep him healthy.” So Grandma Mish and Grandpa Claude took their firstborn to the doctor in September 1921. And the vaccine was “bad,” according to you Mom.
And Dante took sick and died.
What an unspeakable tragedy for my poor grandparents. My grandmother was only 20 years old at the time. How did she and Grandpa cope? One day your sweet baby boy is alive and laughing and smiling and making gurgling noises in his crib and the next day he's gone. How do you recover from such devastation? I can only imagine the oceans of tears that were spilled. And the gaping heartache, both for my grandparents and also for my great grandmother.
I shudder to think about it. In fact I won't let myself make the connection to my granddaughter, who is at that age. I just refuse to imagine it happening.
By the time I learned about baby Dante, sitting with my grandmother in her bedroom one day looking at an old photo, Grandma Mish was middle aged. She had gone on to give birth to five more boys (including another Dante Antonio, father to my cousin Pat.) My grandparents also had a daughter, my mother. In the end, Mish and Pop were exceedingly rich in family and had dozens of grandchildren. Their house was always full of people, and delicious food, and lots of talk and laughter.
But the sadness never went away entirely.
One day, when she was a child, my cousin Pat was rummaging through my grandmother's dresser drawers, and she happened on an envelope with the name Dante written on the outside. That being her Dad's name, she peeked inside the envelope and found a lock of curly blonde hair.
She carried the envelope out to the kitchen and excitedly, she said, "Look, Grandma, I found a lock of my dad's hair!" Grandma Mish replied, "Oh no, honey, that hair belonged to another baby named Dante." My cousin still gets teary-eyed telling the story. And she says her father was always overly protected by his parents. They were always fearful something bad would happen to him. And he grew up fearful himself.
What an unspeakable tragedy for my poor grandparents. My grandmother was only 20 years old at the time. How did she and Grandpa cope? One day your sweet baby boy is alive and laughing and smiling and making gurgling noises in his crib and the next day he's gone. How do you recover from such devastation? I can only imagine the oceans of tears that were spilled. And the gaping heartache, both for my grandparents and also for my great grandmother.
I shudder to think about it. In fact I won't let myself make the connection to my granddaughter, who is at that age. I just refuse to imagine it happening.
By the time I learned about baby Dante, sitting with my grandmother in her bedroom one day looking at an old photo, Grandma Mish was middle aged. She had gone on to give birth to five more boys (including another Dante Antonio, father to my cousin Pat.) My grandparents also had a daughter, my mother. In the end, Mish and Pop were exceedingly rich in family and had dozens of grandchildren. Their house was always full of people, and delicious food, and lots of talk and laughter.
But the sadness never went away entirely.
One day, when she was a child, my cousin Pat was rummaging through my grandmother's dresser drawers, and she happened on an envelope with the name Dante written on the outside. That being her Dad's name, she peeked inside the envelope and found a lock of curly blonde hair.
She carried the envelope out to the kitchen and excitedly, she said, "Look, Grandma, I found a lock of my dad's hair!" Grandma Mish replied, "Oh no, honey, that hair belonged to another baby named Dante." My cousin still gets teary-eyed telling the story. And she says her father was always overly protected by his parents. They were always fearful something bad would happen to him. And he grew up fearful himself.
E Dante si ammalò e mori.
ODDIO! Sono cosi triste quando penso all’orrible idea di perdure un bambino prezioso!
Baby Dante was buried in Tarriffville, Connecticut in the graveyard next to the tiny church called St. Bernhard’s, where Mish and Claude had married only the year before. The baby joins the rest of the family buried there, including today, you, Mom, and three of your five brothers, and your parents and your grandparents. And last August, Dad was laid beside you too. All of you live on in our hearts. We are bound to each other and to you in love, the most powerful force in the universe, which lives forever into eternity.
Il bambino Dante nato è sepolto in Tariffville, Connecticut nel cimitero accanto alla chiesetta chiamata Saint Bernhard’s, siamo las missione che Mish e Pop si era sposato solo l’anno prima. Il bambino unise il resto della famiglia sepolto lì, tra cui oggi tu, Mamma, e tre dei tuoi fratelli, i tuoi genitori e i tuoi nonni. E lo scorso agosto anche Papà era accanto a te. Tutti quanti viviamo nei nostri cuori. Siamo legati gli uni agli altri e a voi innanorati della forza, più potente dell’universo che vive per sempre nell’eternità.
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