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Rina
and yours truly in a picture taken
when I was about 1 year old (I think?). Nonna Rina
was 61. |
Certainly
I can't say that I know everything there is to
know about my grandmother Rina, since by the
time I was born she was already in her 60s,
but I can try to put some feelings and
thoughts into shape, and rekindle some old
memories.
Our
family has always been very close, not a
normal thing these days, but something I will
always strive to, even though I live very far
away from any and all my family members! The
physical distance between people does not mean
that they have to put an emotional
distance.
I
grew up in Italy with my family, and both sets
of my grandparents lived nearby. As a child I
always loved to visit Nonna Rina and Nonno
Mario (my father's parents), they lived in an
area where they had a mini-farm and they grew
lots of vegetables and fruits, along with
raising many chicken and rabbits. It's my
understanding that over the years before I was
born they had more animals, such as horses and
a cow, but all I remember aside the chickens
and the rabbits was the dog Fido, who bit me
once! The great thing about the rabbits and
the chickens was that there were always baby
rabbits or chicks to see, they were so cute! I
used to help feed them and pick out the eggs.
We religiously used to go visit them every
Saturday and spend the afternoon there. I used
to like it a lot because we used to play
outside in the field and little wood area and
use up our energies running around. We had
several little friends that lived in the area
that we basically grew up with, and every Saturday
we played together. There was
a swing and hay area where we used to play
around with, along with a particular fig tree
that I absolutely loved. I used to climb up
and stay there for literally hours eating figs,
reading or play around with my sisters. In the winter
we used to make snowmen or slide down the side
of the hill. My mom and dad in the meantime
basically visited with Nonna Rina and Nonno Mario
and my dad helped in
picking the fruits/vegetables or took care of the plants. My dad was
always involved in taking care of the garden,
not just on Saturdays, and they grew a lot of things, such as
tomatoes, lettuce, zucchini, beans and
anything else you can imagine. They also had a
variety of fruit plants, such as apricots,
berries (of all kinds), apples, chestnuts (and
my dad used to always make roasted chestnuts!
Yum!) and, of course, strawberries. Nonna
Rina's pride and joy I remember being the
flowers area. She used to love her flowers!
That is something I will never forget.
The
house they lived in was very old, built
sometime around the end of the 19th century,
and all the doors opened to the outside, there
was no way to get from any one room to
another without
going outside. The kitchen also doubled as a
living room area, and the bedrooms were
upstairs. The bathroom was also outside in a
little room of its own.
Little
by little they started getting rid of things,
they had less chickens, and less rabbits; when
the latest 'Fido' died (they had many Fidos
over the years) they did not replace him. It
was the end of an era. When I was in my
pre-teens, my aunt Anna bought a condominium
and she, along with Nonna Rina and Nonno Mario
moved there.
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| 4
Generations! This picture was taken in
1998, Nonna Rina was 95 years old. I
am sitting next to her with my Nicky
on my lap, and behind us my mom and
dad. |
However,
they never did get rid of the garden. Because
of the weird ownership of the land they had,
they were able to still go take care of their
vegetables and fruits, since the condo was
only a short walking distance away. Over the
years there would be less and less garden
area, I am assuming that they went from a full
time job of selling their products to only
just have enough for themselves. Because of
this I always somehow prefer having a nice
plate of vegetables than any hamburger in the
world, and in turn I would rather have a fruit
as a snack rather than some potato chips any
day of the week! Could this be why my grandma
is living so long? The healthy diet? If only
more people ate the way I do, there would
certainly be less heart attacks. But.. I
digress. They were able to keep the
gardens up until very recently, in 2001 the
land owners finally tore everything down with
plans to build new houses in the area. It was
so unreal to see that entire area that I
played so much in as a child completely
'gone'. Thankfully I have pictures.
Moving to the
condo marked an important step in my
grandparent's lives, they finally actually had
a heater! They were in
their 70s at the time, but unfortunately Nonno
Mario would not get to enjoy it very much
because he passed away just a few years later.
It was a strange time for me because the year
prior my other grandpa died, and the year
before that my other grandma had died of
breast/lung cancer, which was after a long and
horrible illness. I was almost expecting for
Nonna Rina to die too, but thankfully she hung
in there all these years!
When she was
80 years old Nonna Rina took her first
airplane ride to visit my aunt's family in the
U.S.! I was staying with my aunt at the time so
it was an amazing event. We even took her
sightseeing! We went to San Diego, the Grand
Canyon, Las Vegas, Hollywood and even to
Disneyland! Nonna Rina has always been very
active and rode her bike up until close to her
80th birthday, which is remarkable.
One thing I
must mention that I will never forget as long
as I live is the conversation I had with Nonna
Rina a couple of months after my son Alex was
stillborn at full term. Nonna Rina is possibly
the only person in my entire family that would
understand my loss, as she had a stillborn
baby girl close to full term herself that they
had named Francesca. Of course this happened
way back in the days just after World War II,
so I was not sure if she even could remember
the feelings surrounding such unspeakable
loss, but, somehow, she was the first person I
talked to in my entire family (aside my mom!)
that made me realize she truly understood. She
told me that I was never, ever going to
forget. But the pain, that emotional pain
would dissipate a bit over the years. That you
learned to live with it. She was right, of
course. It was the best insight I ever
got.
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|
December
2001 was the last time I saw Nonna Rina.
In this picture taken on Christmas
Day, Rina (then 98) is holding Nicky's
hand. I am hovering behind them. |
When I went
to Italy in 1998 for 8 months when Nicky was
little she was to taken by Nicky and they
formed a bond I will never forget. Nicky was
less than 2 years old at the time, but he was
so considerate of his "Nonna Bis"
(in Italian great-grandma is translated as
Bisnonna, but since all the
great-grandchildren call her Nonna Bis, that
name kinda stuck). When she was getting ready
to get up and needed her cane, Nicky would go
get it right away. Rina often said that of all
her great-grandchildren, Nicky reminded her of
my dad (her first baby) when he was little the
most.
When I went
to visit Italy in December 2001 (which is the
last time I saw her) I sat next to her and
held her hand. While I was doing this I
noticed that she was still wearing her wedding
ring! I was intrigued and warmed at the same
time. She had gotten married in February 1930,
and her husband had died some 23 years
earlier. When I asked her if Nonno Mario's
name was engraved inside with the wedding
date, she said yes, but when I asked to see
it, she replied that she could not take off
the ring, and that she never took it off since
it was put on her finger so long ago (70+
years). Part of me did not want to believe
this (impossible! I thought) but then my dad
nodded and told me that it was true... that he
had never seen her without it. Wow. I then
asked her to tell me how she met Nonno Mario
and for the next thirty minutes or so she went
on and on about her life as a young girl and a
young woman in her 20s in extreme detail
(which caught me by surprise since these are
things that happened 70-80 years ago!) and how
she and her sister Caterina never wanted to
get married, but when she met Mario she
changed her mind! It was heartwarming to say
the least. She then explained where they
lived, what they did and everything in
between.
What's most
amazing about Nonna Rina is her resiliency.
While a couple of years before her 100th
birthday she was not doing very well, forgetting people and names and her
health deteriorating, she then improved
dramatically!
Yes, IMPROVED! How can a 100 year old woman
improve? I am a strong believer of personal strength.
In 1998 she told me matter of factly that she
had 'no intention' of dying anytime soon!
Unfortunately she took a bad fall in the
spring of 2005 and never recovered from it.
She was bedridden and in a lot of pain from
that point on. She went to be with the angels
in late June 2005. I love you Nonna Rina!!
Yours,
Silvia