Family Night, end of summer

August 14, 2009

It is Friday, and I have a few plans for the weekend. None of which are extremely thrilling. Last night, Jenn and her new flame, Matt, went on a date to see the Steelers play their pre-season opener against the Cardinals, and I went to Carbones, an Italian restaurant in Crabtree, for dinner. My dad’s side of the family has been going to Carbones since he was five years old, and I have frequented the restaurant my whole life—usually with all seventeen members of our clan. We don’t use menus because we always order the same thing, and I feel like I am in my own dining room.

Nowadays, it is particularly harder to organize everyone for an evening out due to all the activities of the grandchildren, as we are getting older. Lindsey lives in Morgantown as a pharmaceutical sales rep with her new husband, Dane. I am living my currently unstable life between Italy and the US, Christopher just moved to Williamsburg to attend law school at William and Mary, Christa, Patrick and Robert are moving up to college next week, and Alyssa and Courtney are busy in high school. We were fewer in number last night, but we had a wonderful time together; as usual, we gorged ourselves on onion rings, salad, pizza, and pasta.

My Pappy, in his usual sauce-comparison curiosity, asked me if the sauce in Italy is the same as at Carbones; even though he visited the country three times, I describe how they don’t dump as much sauce on the pasta. I would like to try to cook more in Italy so I can describe the differences in greater detail. Pap rode home in our car, and he was depressed because everyone was leaving so soon, most of his grandchildren off to different places. He has become increasingly preoccupied and worried about my permanence in Italy, and he keeps asking me if I’ll be home for Christmas. “Of course I will be home for Christmas, Pap.” Without question. He tells me that he is put at ease focusing on my promise of return. Anyways, it makes me a little sad because I know that it is hard on all of my grandparents to see the family spread out.

We all came back to my house and jumped in my pool. It was a brisk end-of-summer night, and there was steam rising up from the heated water. My mom has been wanting us all to participate in a family night swim all summer, and the outside air felt refreshing as we floated around trying to keep most extremities under the water. Mom had prepared a banana cake with fresh fruit, and the decaf was brewed for an after-dinner treat.

Most of my family stood in a circle, talking in the pool, and my Dad and Pap sat on the deck. I kept Pap company, and he once again expressed the reason for his melancholy mood. I told him that it was important that he enjoy the present moments fully instead of passing the time anticipating the future, or focalizing negatively on any period that isn’t now. He of course agreed unwillingly, and he laughed. Since I have been home, my Pap enjoys giving me Italian tests; He thinks about words that he remembers from his childhood with his family and amongst the large Italian population, and he waits for my confirmation and translation. He tells me that I help bring back memories and words that he remembers from when he was a kid, and he often prepares new words for every time we get together. I love playing this game with him.

Pap was extra bothered tonight because he was leaving for Atlantic City with Gram the next day. Gram was anxiously packing at home for their four day get-away because she wanted everything prepared for their 5am departure the next day with another couple. Pap had no desire to go, especially due to the imminent departures of grandchildren, and Gram also lamented the bad timing of their trip earlier that night. I was looking up at Pap sitting on the pool deck with a jacket wrapped around his shoulders. He was sipping his cup of coffee.

My Pap is funny because when my mom offered coffee to him initially he said he didn’t want any—in fact, he said that he didn’t want her to make him any. That is the key. We say that Pap speaks in code, and he is so courteous that you never know exactly what he actually wants usually. At this point, Pap is used to Gram telling him what he wants and doesn’t want, she fixes his plate at family dinners, and others can easily persuade him to different sides of his own decisions without much persuasion. My Pap goes with the flow of the people that are looking out for him, and he never wants someone to do something extra on his account. Therefore, it is always humorous to watch Pap in his constant and confusing battle of his wants, their wants, and what everyone else thinks he wants. At the end, it just leaves most of us to always doubt his initial response-making sure many times over, and in the end, you are not sure if you convinced him of his will or made him change his mind. It is very funny.

He once told me that my younger sister asked him if he wanted an ice cream at the Dairy Queen. He can never turn down his grandchildren, and he ate the blizzard despite being Lactose intolerant—a fact of which my sister was not aware.

It in fact wasn’t a very good night for him because he was really lamenting going on this trip—Pap hates gambling, hates casinos, and he never plays the games. I thought that in the spirit of our Italian word games, I would give him one of my books on Italian vocabulary and expressions for him to pass the time—in the car etc. I couldn’t find my small book, so I gave him my precious vocabulary bible that hasn’t left my side for over two years. I swear it comes everywhere with me even if I don’t usually open it. I also gave him the book, “Fare una Bella Figura” by Beppe Severigni for Gram. It is a very humorous book written in English about the endless eccentricities and intricacies of the Italian culture and behavior. I know she’d love it if she got a chance to read it.

We all said bye to Pap, and I got sad as he walked to the car with my dad. I know it is all very hard on him. I hope he browsed my Italian book all the way to the beach.

I am faced with the reality that I’ll be returning to Italy in exactly ten days, and I have to prepare myself mentally and physically for the transition. In addition, Christa and Robert, my siblings, will be heading back to Penn State on Wednesday. I, too, am sad as I watch our family get older. It makes me sad to think that our time spent always under one roof has come to an end, and I know that I contradict my own advice to my grandfather in feeling sad over the passage of time. I guess it is just this season that stirs up these emotions—the end of summer, the coming of fall and new changes, the smell in the air. It is like all of the bees and flowers know they don’t have much time left, and they raise their voices to a greater hum and flurry right before the changes of green.

I lifeguarded at a local pool for many summers at a local pool during high school and the beginning of college. I remember sitting in my chair at the end of the season looking out at the trees, as only one or two people were swimming in the large pool. The hot and crowded summer days of French fries, frozen candy bars and sun-lotioned kids screaming had died down to a tranquility that left me anxious in my own skin, as if everything around me-the waterslide, the orange bathrooms, the empty picnic tables, the trees in the distance were all waiting for something—a lull of slow time. I twirled my whistle. I always feel this way, and I can picture myself propped in my observant perch now.

I was so tired that night—after much pool conversation with the family, I got ready for bed and fell asleep on my book.