September 17 2023 — Existential Autotrip

September 17, 2023
# 1620

Flash!
Pretty amazing. First week out, Do You Believe in Magic topped the Amazon chart.
Note that we were one of only three in top 25 that garnered the full 5 stars of readers’ approval.

Top right in the Number One place: Do You Believe in Magic

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COVER/ Mailbag
This from friend and participant in the book effort, Howard D:

No this is not what I’m working on. At best, it informs, in a way what I’m working on. Anyway, I thought you needed some of these thoughts:

Italian is Cool – Ay… Marone!

Are you kidding me? I’m from the Bronx, man, also a boy of the streets. And to us, in New York, of which there is no better city, and in the Bronx, of which there is no better borough, no matter what Brooklyn says. And we weren’t poor, we were semi-poor. Poor was in New Jersey.

Hackensack. Hoboken. Newark for chrissake. But back to the point…

Let me assure you man, cool in New York meant Italian. And take it from me, who is a Jew, and we had plenty fed to us morning ’til night, about how great the Jews are, my man. But Italian was it.

But Italian was what? come on… ?? I mean what? Marone… Sinatra, great as he was, doesn’t cover all of it it. He’s the template, but when we were kids he was almost washed up, and he played that Maggio, that sad character, to bring himself back. But he was the template, no doubt. But we also had, come on, where do you mention them? The A-team, Damone, Martino, Como (OK yeah, you mention him, but did you know he was a barber? I mean even we knew that in the Bronx; everyone knows the best barbers were Italians. My barber, right next to my usual candy store for egg creams and penny candy that was actually a penny, and five cent Pepsi, was Mr. K, of whom there was no better, and so who better than he to give me my first haircut ever. Mr. K had a picture, signed, of Perry Como, framed, in his shop.) Where was I? Oh yeah, the A-team, and what about Mario Lanza, a crooner, and a pop star, and a opera big shot. Right in the spirit of one of the greatest, I mean of them all, Caruso, who was the real McColatino, from the old country no less, and scratch most of those crooners (whom, cough cough, you don’t care to mention, but who did their share of carrying the torch into the stadium to light the eternal flame, if you know what I mean) and you’re one boat trip for their parents direct from the old country, and of course Dino, who, yeah yeah, you do mention, but what about the other Martin, Tony, who, you gotta’ laugh, was Jewish, but desperate to make you think Italian, right? Why, because Jewish is cool? No Italian is cool.

And the babes, come on, man. Are you kidding me with Audrey Hepburn and Elizabeth Taylor? Beauties, yes, and exquisite, but that’s the problem, untouchable. And yet, not a word about Anna Magnani, Sophia Lauren, Claudia Cardinale, Gina Lollabrigida (just saying her name made a guy hard), Virna Lisi, Monica Vitti, Italian women were the mold of desirable and emotional women of deep feeling, and from up and down the boot.

Don’t get me started. But you did compadre, but I gotta’ stop, and I didn’t even mention all the Italian directors on both sides of the Mississippi (plus the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean and the Adriatic) who from the war (the only war, really … wasn’t it?) to the 80s made an indelible mark on world cinema along with the French guys. Not enough Americans went to see their films at the time (me? I saw Two Women when it came out, marone! What a movie), but the Americans making movies did.

And while I’m at it, who made the best western movies after a gentleman named John Ford, who couldn’t get no whiter, but another gentleman who studied every frame Ford ever shot, named Sergio Leone. Italian, man, is cool.

And by the way, one more thing, amico… Eisenhower? Dad? Grandad. Yeah. Not dad. He was warmer than a dad. And more reliable. And balder. And older.

We had a splendid meal at Il Palaggio at the Four Seasons hotel
More in coming weeks

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Commentary
It’s been a busy time. Three weeks ago I published a book. Two weeks ago I took an eight day trip to Tuscany. I suffered a bit of jet lag. And Sept 16 is my book launch. No wonder that I enjoyed not having a lot of appointments for the next several days.

I used the time well. I was able to develop a new daily routine that incorporates the weekly publication of this existentialautotrip ezine, prepping for the ‘Do You Believe in Magic’ book launch, critically reading my granddaughter’s just published book, ‘Trouble the Living’, [I will be writing a review of it in a couple of weeks], picking up my own dormant manuscript, ‘Conflicted’, for editing, (I had set it aside to publish ‘Do You Believe in Magic’), spending a little time creating a new Spotify playlist, learning how to deal with Amazon as our printer, and, very importantly, marketing the book, ‘Do You Believe in Magic’.

And, daily, I have to cook for myself, lift weights, walk seven miles, make my toilet, read and watch TV, Oh, my!

How could you tell he was Italian?
by Lino Viola

One of fifty stories written by thirty authors.
Buy the book on Amazon or from your local bookstore. If they don’t have it in stock, they will get it for you.

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Do You Believe in Magic? Anthology of Stories from the North End
How Could You Tell If He Was Italian?
Lino Viola

Step back now to those thrilling days of yesteryear (50’s and 60’s) and see if you can answer this question:  In high school how could you distinguish an Italian boy from the rest?

You may have said:

1. by his swagger
2. Or even by his clothes
3. How about his DA haircut
4. By the olive-skinned complexion
5. Or by the gold chain and crucifix around his neck

Yes, those are all good indicators, but think hard because there was ONE sure fire sign that told you someone was Italian.

OK, if you have not gotten it by now you never will.

Answer –he was the kid carrying the brown lunch bag with the (olive) oil stain on the bottom.

I bring you back to 1961, the basement cafeteria of Boston Latin School; at that time an all boy’s school with a strict dress code and discipline; a school that taught you time management by giving you the least possible amount of minutes to get between classes or suffer the pain of a misdemeanor mark; a school where a good percentage of students were of the Jewish persuasion and Latin was required for all six years, that’s if you started in the seventh grade - Oh, the abuse those poor sixies (seventh graders) took from the upper classmen.

Peek into a window of the typical short lunch time a student had (it was about 23 minutes). I would meet a group of kids from Eastie and the North End for lunch and we would sit at a long table. Over to our right were the non-Italians. You could tell them by their neatly folded and creased little flimsy brown bags (bags bought specifically for lunches) made to house two slices of Wonder bread with either one slice of bologna and cheese or peanut butter and jelly. That brown bag could be neatly folded and reused for weeks because the contents did no harm to it.

Like many of the other Italian kids, our brown bags were big, thick and sturdy, for in their previous life they probably carried a few loaves of bread or a few pounds of peppers or onions, you know the number 15 industrial strength bags and weren’t so neat looking – no nice crease folded in but a top that was rolled up as best as possible and oh yes, the (olive) oil stain that by 11:30 had really permeated the bottom.

When an Italian kid was about to open his lunch bag the whole table to the right would go quiet, a precursor to the E F Hutton commercial of today as all eyes would turn to see what you had brought for lunch. Well number one you knew you had no Wonder bread but a corner of a bastone or slices of scali or French or even a nice spacchi roll. This was wrapped in waxed paper that was very oily by this time and thankfully your mom had the foreknowledge of what this would look like five hours later and would always include some napkins (oh, God Bless them for they thought of everything). Inside this delicious bread was for most times the previous night’s leftovers. One of my favorites was sausage and broccoli rabe and eating one of those required using both hands. None of my sandwiches were ever cut diagonally nor could they be easily handled by two fingers as were those perfect ones that the other kids had.

We had eggs and whatever combination; with peppers, or potatoes or onions etc.; all kinds of omelets between the Italian bread. Veal and eggplant parmigiana, meatball subs, and cold cuts, etc. My mom was afraid that the cold cut sandwich would be too dry by itself so she always put something oily in the middle such as fried peppers for fear that I might choke. Friday was the day that you couldn't eat meat, and if I didn't have a frittata I would have tuna - no, not the one packed in water, but the Italian tuna (Genoa or Pastene) which was packed in, you guessed it, olive oil.

These were the days before plastic wrap or plastic containers so the bread became the conduit for carrying part of last night’s meal. Sometimes I would feel bad for some of those very pale white thin kids and give them a piece of my sandwich, a sandwich made enough to last you if you had to stay after school or got delayed on the T. Mom was always thinking ahead. 

Our bags could not be recycled like the others and there were some drawbacks to having such a lunch. One was that the afternoon classes were a killer because my full stomach would often cause me to doze off. The other was that you had to be careful carrying your lunch, especially on a packed Green Line train. You did not want to have that sandwich smashed because you would cause an oil spill. I carried my brown bag in the same hand that held on to the overhead rail.

Hey, 90% of the time we brown bagged it. The only thing I liked in the cafeteria was hot dogs and brownies – but now that I think about it my mom would also occasionally chop up some hot dogs and make a frittata; eggs and hot dogs.

We had truly little but never expected that the school would feed us for nothing. We had loving parents and grandparents who loved us and made sure that we were well fed. You can keep your Betty Crocker; we had our moms who would send us off with the Italian Good Seal of Approval - the olive oil stain on the bottom of the brown lunch bag.

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Kat’s Gen Z Corner

The Most Beautiful Man on Earth

I don’t remember the last time I was so deeply moved by a piece of art as I was with Michaelangelo’s David. I relished in Botticelli’s Primavera in Florence’s Uffitzi gallery and made my father and boyfriend listen to two different audio tours about it. (Rick Steves’ was the best.) I was again overwhelmed by the biblical scope (and content) of Michaelangelo’s frescoes at the Sistine Chapel in Rome. But David took my breath away.

I was starstruck by him. I was humbled by the magnitude of his perfection and effortless grace. When you round the corner in the Accademia Gallery, you see him from 300 feet away, towering over the crowd gawking onlookers and photo-takers. He’s outlined by a tall arched ceiling with natural light falling down upon him, further impressing his celestial nature. Having the privilege to witness David’s beauty is the kind of experience that makes you want to escape the mundanity of everyday life and hide in poetry for the rest of your days. Unironically, really, he reaffirms the possibility of God.

Sam Anderson wrote perhaps the most comprehensive and beautiful piece on Michaelangelo’s statue in the New York Times Magazine a few years back called “David’s Ankles: How Imperfections Could Bring Down the World’s Most Perfect Statue.” Will and I listened to it on the car ride from Arezzo to Rome. You can find the audio version here, which I highly recommend. I’ll end with his description of seeing David for the first time when he was 20.

“The David suggested that my true self existed most fully in some interstellar superhistorical realm in which all the ideal things of the universe commingled in a perpetual ecstasy of harmonizing trumpet blasts. If such perfection could exist in the world, I felt, then so many other things were suddenly possible: to live a perfect life creating perfect things, to find an ideal way to be. What was the point of anything less?... Again, I was 20.”

Dom on left, ezine publisher, Kat in center, of Gen Z corner, and Will, on right, soon to be on staff

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Tucker’s Corner

I can’t remember the last time I saw a right over the plate comedy in the theater. Barbie is hysterical but it had more work to do than to simply make us laugh. Comedies have become a lost art and even when they do get made they’re often intended for or dumped onto a streaming service rather than going anywhere near the silver screen. Luckily if you live in the Boston area both Kendall Square and Coolidge have a new one that’s absolutely worth the price of admission. This is Bottoms.

There’s a famous Oscar Wilde quote that goes “everything is sex, except sex, which is power.” The main characters of Bottoms, the hysterical new comedy from Shiva Baby (equally hilarious) director Emma Seligman, have taken the mirror image of that quote to heart. In Bottoms, everything is violent except violence. Violence is exhilarating.

High school seniors Josie (Ayo Edebiri) and PJ (Rachel Sennott) enter the film in 1980’s comedy fashion. They’re devising a plan on how to get other girls in their class to sleep with them. They take an early opportunity to point out that they’re unpopular at their school. Not begcause they’re gay but because they’re gay and untalented. A rumor circulates early in their final year of high school that they both spent the summer in juvie. It’s a rumor they mistakenly give credence to. Further evidence of their supposed violent tendencies comes when they accidentally hit the school’s star quarterback with their car, a move believed to be purposeful. And so, Josie and PJ begin senior year with some false street cred that they parlay into allowing the school to let them start a women’s self-defense club.

Of course, they don’t know squat about self-defense. Much like a standard 80’s comedy but with the genders reversed, these girls start the club for the same reason jocks from those movies play football. To get the attention of the cheerleaders. The flaw in their plan and the film’s clear focus is to remove the helmets and pads that football players get to wear and instead allow these girls to wail on one another to vent their teenage frustrations as viscerally as possible.

The atmosphere of Bottoms is perfectly exaggerated. Football players wear their uniforms (cleats included) every day. A history class reenactment of the Treaty of Versailles turns into a brawl that people barely pay attention to. Pep rallies tart with the command to “get horny!”. All of this is done to allow the girl’s fight club to continue unnoticed by the larger student population. It also winds up being the one place in the whole school that centers on female students.

The script, co-written by the director and one of the stars (Sennott) is wall to wall perfect jokes. Bottoms clocks in at just over 90 minutes and it flies by. The tone the script sets is midway between a cartoon and a school play, keeping anything that could have been portrayed too graphically or distastefully off screen. Because the school is portrayed so lawlessly it keeps the film from feeling like an attempt to empower any particular group too overtly. This isn’t a film about queer people or female empowerment. Instead, its matter-of-fact high school movie positing that anyone from any gender has feelings of desire and angst and that any actor of any stripe could step into the film and it would still ring true.

Bottoms’ most interesting idea might be how it presents violence as a facet of power and maleness without relating it to masculinity. In this film’s universe it’s the male students who exhibit stereotypically feminine attributes like emotionality and vanity. Ultimately, it’s just one of the dozen reasons why Bottoms is worth your time. Comedies being released theatrically are rapidly becoming a lost part of our culture, so we have to keep reminding distributors that we don’t just want cookie cutter movies released on algorithmically designed schedules. We need films that take full abandon in their writing and performances and much like the girls at the heart of this fight club focused story, come out swinging.

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Writing
Writing often requires researching. In this case, I am critically reading my granddaughter’s new book, Trouble the Living. When I’m done reading it, I will write and share a review of the book.

***Ratatouille niçoise***
***Marcus Guimarães*** - ***Flickr***
Ռատատույով լի տապակ։
Permission details
This image, which was originally posted to ***Flickr**, was uploaded to Commons using*** ***Flickr upload bot*** ***on 18 December 2007, 12:44 by*** ***Tiptop**. On that date, it was confirmed to be licensed under the terms of the license indicated.***

RATATOUILLE
is a French Provençal dish of stewed vegetables that originated in Nice and is sometimes referred to as ratatouille niçoise. Recipes and cooking times differ widely, but common ingredients include tomato, garlic, onion, zucchini, eggplant, bell pepper, and some combination of leafy green herbs common to the region.

Ingredients:
1 medium eggplant
2 medium zucchini
1 large onion
1 bell pepper (red, yellow, or green)
chili pepper to taste
4 ripe tomatoes
4 cloves garlic, minced
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon dried thyme (or a few sprigs of fresh thyme)
1 teaspoon dried rosemary (or a few sprigs of fresh rosemary)
Salt and pepper to taste
Fresh basil and/or parsley

Prepare the Vegetables:
Wash and peel the eggplant if desired, then cut it into 1-inch cubes.

Slice the zucchini into 1/2-inch rounds.

Slice the onion.

Core the bell pepper, remove the seeds, and cut them into strips or chunks.

Blanch the tomatoes in boiling water for 30 seconds, then transfer them to a bowl of ice water. Peel off the skin, remove the seeds, and chop the flesh.

Sauté the Vegetables:
Heat the olive oil in a large skillet or Dutch oven over medium heat.

Add the diced onion and minced garlic to the Dutch Oven.
Sauté for a few minutes until the onion becomes translucent.

Add the eggplant and herbs
Cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the eggplant starts to soften.
Remove and reserve the veggies.

If needed, add more olive oil.
Add Zucchini and Bell Peppers to the Dutch Oven.
Cook for 5 minutes or until softened, stirring occasionally.
Return the eggplant.
Add the dried herbs, salt and pepper.
Stir in the chopped tomatoes.
Add the fresh basil.

Simmer:

Reduce the heat to low, cover the skillet or pot.
Let the ratatouille simmer for about 20-30 minutes, or until all the vegetables are tender and the flavors meld together.
Stir occasionally.

Adjust the seasoning:

Serve:
Ratatouille can be served hot, cold, or at room temperature. It pairs well with crusty bread, rice, pasta, or as a side to grilled meats or fish.

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Chuckles and Thoughts
"When you're born, you get a ticket to the freak show. When you're born in America, you get a front-row seat."
George Carlin

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Six Word Stories
"Whispers in darkness, hope lights path."

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Understanding Ageing
My daughter, Kat, and her boyfriend and my friend, Will, spent a week in Florence together. When it comes to my needing help with luggage or support up a long flight of stairs, the stumble over each other to provide helping hands. I love them for it.

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Social Life
And the way they provided help to me, they also supplied wonderful quality time.

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Mail and other Conversation
We love getting mail, email, or texts, including links.

Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
text to 617.852.7192

This from Tony Cortese:

My family lived in the historic North End of Boston for over 90 years. The close knit, vibrant Italian American family culture in an area with as many as 30,000 people in less than 3/4 of a square mile (!) made for a special experience for those of us growing up during the socially dynamic 1950's-1970's. Though there have been many scholarly books and articles written about this historic area, the stories of what life was like then have rarely been told exclusively through the voices of those living there. "Do You Beiieve in Magic?" is a refreshing anthology of stories, vignettes, observations and reflections of real life from 30 residents and former residents in their own words. The lifelong NE resident and editor, Dom Capossela, guides the reader through the cultural history of that era and the part that Italian Americans played, including protecting the area from destructive urban renewal. Complete with photos, the individual stories are poignant, honest, funny, reflective, nostalgic and serious. Great book to read in one sitting or read some excerpts, put it down and pick it up again, especially accompanied by little Vin Santo or Anisette to sip! You will almost be able to smell the Italian gravy (tomato sauce to non North Enders) or visualize the pastry at a Sunday dinner or at one of the many religious festivals. Anyone who has ever visited the North End will get a unique perspective about the pride that North Enders have about this neighborhood that some call magical, and will have an enjoyable read.
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Travel
I’ll be writing a good deal on travel in the weeks to come.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sep 13 September 17 2023

Italian is Cool – Ay… Marone!