Cousin Cousine

Nick, Lucia and Matteo

Mi madre, Lucia Fanelli Maderer, had two brothers -- Matteo and Nicholas. They grew up in the Italian ghetto of New Haven, Connecticut in the late 1920s and '30s. Their parents/my grandparents, who I never met, had come over from the small town of Gioia del Colle, near Bari, in south east Italy.

Matt and Nick stayed in the New Haven area, while Lucy spun off to Miami and Manhattan to seek her fortune and, possibly, meet Mister Right. With fortunes elusive and Mister Right being out of the country, presumably on business, Lucy decided to return to New Haven and go to college. All this being pretty radical and adventurous considering the time (mid 1940s) and her background (poor immigrant laborers -- I imagine, at the least, college seemed an unattainable dream).

It was at the New Haven Teacher’s College (now Southern Connecticut State University) that my mother met my father. He was at the not yet coed Yale and a busboy in the dining hall of the teacher’s college. He would zero in, hovering by my mother’s lunch table, in efforts to be noticed and make some serious time with her.

He made play after big play, eventually wearing her down -- their lifelong love/hate/love/annoyance relationship began. That and the seemingly endless, to me anyway, nomadic years. Each school year brought a new prep school or college town -- a brandy new apartment, different schools for the kids, fresh hurdles to clear and challenges to meet. Joy.

We’d head back to the New Haven area once a year to visit mother’s brothers and their families. We were, assuredly, alien-esque to them just as much as they were to us -- particularly my Uncle Matt’s family.  Their four kids, all near to my age, were full of life, energy, top 40 culture, with grand amounts of confidence and exuberance. Bleak kid that I was, when told to go play with them, I’d stand at the sidelines, seemingly invisible, watching -- watching and waiting for the never arriving invitation to join the big fun.

Uncle Nick’s three kids were all older than I. Danny was the Harley riding warm, friendly buoyant eldest with plans to join the police department. Angie was the secretive, fashion conscious, sorority sister. “Little Nicky,” (who’s now about 6’7” or so) was closest in age but at the ages of 10 and 13, of course, not into playing with his little girl cousins. Oh my, no. We may have been alien-ish in Uncle Nick’s house too but I felt visible and welcomed.

My fav cousins were from my mother’s cousin Carol’s family. They lived in Yonkers. Goddamn I loved visiting them! We seemed to always be heading over the George Washington Bridge on our way to see them with daddy pestering and nagging us all to join him in the bridge song while we crossed. The lyrics consisted of “George Washington Bridge” sung over and over again. I don’t recall the melody (thankfully?). Maybe it’s in the You Tube clip at the end which I might or might not be happy about not being able to hear.

I’ve spoken of Gary and Della, who's written for Tell Me a Story, before. Their older sister Cheryl was in college and not around so much. I remember her though as this astounding, classic beauty. She was Audrey Hepburn, Sophia Loren, Geraldine Chaplin and Cheryl Guzzo -- warm, talented and, oh-my-god-I’ll-never-be-so-gorgeous-and-sophisticated intimidating to little me.

Yup, enough to give a young cousin a complex and a half. Oh yeah and she was really nice to me too. Sheesh.

I’d love to be in contact with Danny and “Little Nicky” again but no amount of Googling, on the slim info I’ve got, brings them up on my screen. I’ve not seen them since Uncle Matt’s funeral, ten years or more ago. As we sat in Matt’s living room after the service, making awkward conversation, I brought up that it’d been 30 years since I’d last been in his house. They allowed that it had been that long for them too. That came as a big shock -- they always lived just a couple of towns apart.

All this time I’d thought that I missed out on the big Hollywood-esque, tight Italian American family childhood because of our peripatetic academic upbringing.

Huh...guess not. Plus, I smell a mystery. Where’s my deerstalker and pipe?!

The George Washington Bridge Song