Tuesday, March 21, 2017
Read at Migliaccio Funeral Home
My mother might have been small in stature, but she was never a frail woman. Known as the Mighty Midget by my brother and his friends, she could hold a Schwinn bicycle in place by the seat while my brother tried frantically to pedal away. My brother gave mom and dad a run for their money. Father Chris said that when Jesus met mom at the Pearly Gates and found out that she was John’s mother, he told her to go straight in.
Mom never missed a day of work and could have qualified as a U.S. postal worker—neither snow, nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night could stay this woman from the swift completion of her appointed rounds at E.F. Hutton, as it was then known, and where she worked for 35 years. I remember begging her to stay home when my classes at Notre Dame or NYU had been canceled. But mom was stalwart. She was needed and off she went. Mom worked in the World Trade Center, as an assistant VP, when the first bombing occurred. Dad wouldn’t allow her to return to work after that. After her retirement party, mom remarked, “What am I supposed to do now?”
Mom and her sisters—as they were an essential part of her life—also never missed a weekend together. On Fridays, they would get their hair done. Saturdays were reserved for shopping at Pesin’s, Cara Carson’s, Minnie Kreps, Nella’s or Mademoiselle or David’s—all now—like mom—gone. On Sundays, we visited—mostly grandma and grandpa and some of dad’s friends, too.
Mom was spotless. From the time we were very young, she would engage us in cleaning. If you were going downstairs, mom would ask you to take a rag and wipe the mahogany bannister while you were at it. Dad once insisted that she have a maid. Mom gave in just once, when dad hired a woman. When I asked the woman’s name, she said it was “Page. Page like in a book.” Page was lovely, but did not pass muster. Mom complained to me that Page actually used the same bucket of water to wash the entire kitchen floor!
Mom was patient. I remember bringing in two bottles of milk, the kind with the cardboard tops and the cream at the top. I was swinging both of them when they flew out of my hands, broke, and spilled everywhere. Mom and I set to cleaning them up wordlessly. She never uttered a word of complaint. Not a word.
Mom was the antithesis of Daddy. She didn’t like to travel (except to her sisters’ houses), but was made to, going to Italy every other year after Dad retired from the restaurant business. I remember mom flying to Rome one Saturday and then calling me the next day. I asked what was going on. Mom and dad had been traveling with Aunt Tillie, who learned that her husband had just died. So they turned around and came right back. It was an exhausting round trip with little to show for it, but they had no choice.
After dad died, John and I moved mom into dad’s house on the Boulevard in Bayonne. We thought it was the right thing to do, after all, mom would be with her sister Little Marge. But it was wrenching for her to leave all she had known with dad and it was too soon after his funeral. As Billy Wilder said, “Hindsight is always twenty-twenty.”
Mom lived there for several years with Little Marge. They were eventually joined by their sister Rose, much to Marge’s dismay and to mom’s serious displeasure. Mom would frequently call crying about some injustice Rose had visited upon her and Little Marge hated giving up her privacy. But after Little Marge’s death, mom put up with Rose more and more. Eventually mom moved downstairs and lived with Rose fulltime.
Unfortunately, one winter, Mom developed pneumonia and was quite ill—unbeknownst to my brother and me. But Rose was stubborn. She wanted to go to Atlantic City on a Thursday and so she dragged my mother to the bus station and off they went. I didn’t see my mother until the following Wednesday. She was in horrible shape, slumped over the table. I took her to the doctor immediately, but should have called 911. The doctor was reluctant to hospitalize her, claiming she would become disoriented. To my mind, disoriented is a far better cry than dead. A week later, we hospitalized her; the antibiotics the doctor prescribed had done little good. As a result of the delay in care, mom suffered a minor heart attack for which the doctors loaded her up with the usual—beta-blocker, statin, aspirin, you name it. My response, of course, was to pitch everything within a week. She was 94 then. Mom remained totally drug free for the remaining 6 years of her life.
Eventually another woman came to live with mom and Rose: Ann Petrilla. John and I had hired Ann for 4 hours a day, but when it became apparent that the women could not be left alone, Ann moved in and stayed until Rose was moved into a home.
I recall how Ann heard some furniture being moved one night as she slept. When she made her way to the kitchen, mom was standing on one of the chairs trying to get to the candy Ann had hidden above a cabinet. Terrified, Ann coaxed her down, knowing she would have to find another place for the candy, as mom would surely repeat the dangerous climb again.
After Rose was moved to the nursing home, mom would not leave Ann’s side. She needed companionship. Mom was used to being with other women, having had 6 sisters to hang around with. Now she needed Ann.
By the time mom moved to Pennsylvania, she barely knew where she was. The change was difficult for her. So Rob and I would write the answers to the same questions she asked daily: Sandy owns this house. This house is in Pennsylvania. Rob has one brother. He lives in California. His name is Crawford. The white dog is Lucia. The black dog is Valentino, and so on.
One of mom’s endearing traits was that she was a flirt. Little Marge said she would never change, and she never did. Mom flirted with her GP, her podiatrist, her dentist, the men who came in and out of my home to do handiwork. And later, she flirted with the chaplains and the male hospice nurse.
Mom had a dazzling and very ready smile. Years ago, when mom was a young woman on Johnston Avenue in Jersey City, someone told her that her smile was so beautiful she should be on the radio. Mom used to tell that story proudly and flash her gorgeous smile. We were never sure she got the joke, or if she just didn’t care!
Mom was always hard of hearing, something that resulted from her nearly having died of diphtheria when she was a year and a half. So she compensated by asking questions and never pausing to listen for the answers. I remember back when I was in high school, a woman at David’s shoe store in Bayonne asked why mom would ask a question and never wait for the answer but ask another question. It gave me pause. Only then did I realize the extent of mom’s problem. Fact is, she rarely heard anything discussed in a crowded room or a room where more than one person was talking. This could be why mom sang the wrong words to Vicino al Mare. She sang them over and over again nearly every day she lived with us. Ann tried teaching her the words, but mom heard what she heard.
As it turned out, mom developed dementia. Mom’s memory failed, but not her ability to function or figure out what things were for and where they went. Consequently, she was always on my case to put things away: “There’s too much stuff on that dresser. Put them away.” These were things the nurses and aids needed, but mom would not have them out. And so, I put them away. Mom wore nonslip socks much of the time. Always the fashion plate, she insisted that the socks match what she was wearing.
Every single day she lived with Rob and me, mom would comment on our clothing: “Where did you get that? I love the color.” Our reply would always be the same, “At the store, mom.” She would look at me and say, “You are so pretty. You were always so pretty. You and Karen.” (Karen and Ann Marie visited mom often. And mom always knew who she was.) I will miss hearing mom comment on my clothing and telling me I am so pretty. But I will not miss hearing mom tell me to put on my shoes before I go out onto the porch or wear a sweater in the middle of summer.
The one thing I prayed for continually was patience. My friend and neighbor Barbara, who—although she barely knew me at the time—helped me move mom from the second floor to the first floor of the house in Bayonne, said I should be careful about praying for patience, as God would test me and send me plenty of opportunities to demonstrate patience. And He did.
It was tough. Rob and I cleaned and sanitized the house and did laundry continually. We had little sleep in the 4 years mom lived with us. She would call through the night, even at the end when she could barely speak. Valentino, who sometimes slept alongside mom’s bed, would hear mom and pace our room until we went downstairs. Mom never liked animals, but Valentino saw her as one of his pack. I could never have cared for mom without the two boys in my life: Rob and Valentino.
You are probably unaware, but Mom was given a choice about when she could leave. A troupe of angels came to her and asked whether she would like to pass on March 16 or on March 17, Saint Patty’s Day. Mom said, “Are you kidding! Not on Saint Patty’s Day! Take me now!” (My apologies to Bob Boyce, Bob Henry, and Sean [the bagpiper]! Mom was an uncompromising Italian.)
As for where mom is now, let me relate this story:
Several months ago, the chaplain came to visit mom and he asked her if she was going to Heaven. Mom’s reply was simple and straightforward: “Oh no,” she said, “I watch what I eat!”
I kept a diary for nearly the entire time mom lived with Rob and me and experienced what Alan Bennett had discovered as recorded in his mostly nonfiction film, “The Lady in the Van”: “You don’t put yourself into what you write. You find yourself there.” Thank you, mommy, for helping me through this sometimes unforgiving process called life. Thank you for helping me find myself. I will always love you.
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