The Creeds that Move Men's Hearts

by Melody Veltri

  “I’d like to stay a little longer,” says Nicoletta. She calls the kids over and tells them that it’s time to say prayers for their papa.

  Mama and I walk back down the hill of the cemetery and halfway down Sharps Hill before either of us speaks.

  “I knew she wasn’t a bad person,” I say, finally.

  “No. Maybe not. But it would be better for her if she begged in the street than do what she does. There’s no sin in begging.”

  We don’t say much on the rest of the walk home. I’ll be glad to get inside and be warm again.

  In spite of what Mama says, I see her slip out the door after she makes tonight’s pasta e fajiole. She’s carrying a big pot with a lid on it, and I confirm my suspicion by looking out the side window. Mama raps on Nicoletta’s door and then leaves the pot on the porch.

  Dear Diary, February 17, 1926

  Thomas More disobeyed the king because his conscience would not let him do otherwise. So what about Mrs. Pantuzzo? If her conscience is clear, is it the same principle? If her first concern was her children—if she sinned to save their lives—isn’t she even something of a martyr? I’d like to discuss this with Sr. Norbert, but I don’t think I can, Irish as she is and being a nun. I’m sure she doesn’t even know what ‘puttana’ means.

  * * *

  On my sixteenth birthday, Mama cooks a big dinner and invites Sara and the Marchettis. With all eleven of us at the table, it’s a tight fit, but it feels like a real party. After dinner, I am given a few gifts to open.

  “This is for you, my bookworm daughter,” says Papa. It’s a new diary—which I need, of course, since it has now been a full year, and my old one is complete—and a black leather Mary Knoll missal. The missal is complete with the readings for all of the feast days of the Church, and it contains lovely color plate illustrations. The whole book zips shut a little cross zipper pull. I’ve never seen a book like this before.

  “Oh brother,” says Lindo, “I hope that’s not what I’m getting on my birthday!”

  We all laugh, but I’m actually thrilled with these gifts. My diary also has a leather cover, complete with a tiny lock and key. My thoughts are now well protected—no one else can have access to them.

  “Happy Birthday, honey,” says Sara. She gives me a kiss on the forehead, and then hands me a small gift in tissue paper. Enclosed are two doilies. They are white with blue cornflowers embroidered on them, and the edges are tatted in pink. I know that they took her a lot of time to make, and Sara has dipped them in liquid starch so that they are stiff.

  “These are beautiful, Sara. One for my dresser and one for my nightstand—they’re perfect.” We smile at each other and hug. There is always something a little sad about Sara. Usually Luca is back by now, and we’re all wondering if he’s ever going to come back. I don’t think Sara misses him—I think she dreads his return. Maybe this time he’ll stay wherever he is. That would be a birthday present for all of us.

  Nana and Rose have made me an almond cream cake. Nana is old, but she still bakes every day, and we all enjoy it with Mama’s coffee. Papa cranks the Victrola and plays arias from La Boheme for us. In no time, Nana is asleep sitting up again. Giuseppe and the boys have begun a game of cards, and while Mama and Sara talk, I find myself brushing and braiding Rose’s hair again. While I’m doing that, she pulls a little piece of paper out of her pocket and hands it to me. It’s a drawing of two hearts—one with my name in it, and one with her name in it—her present to me. I feel lucky that my sixteen years have been in this family, with these good friends.

  Dear Diary, March 24, 1926

  What does it mean to be sixteen years old? I guess I will find out. I think I am as tall as I will ever get, and I haven’t changed my bra size in two years. I think it’s time that Mama lets me wear shoes with heels. Wouldn’t I love to have a dress and shoes like Nicoletta wore to the market? I’d twirl all the way down the street. I think I am old enough for lipstick, too. Maybe when Mama is visiting Sara, I’ll ask Nicoletta if she could teach me how to wear makeup. I’m sure that would make Mama’s hair stand straight on end, but it would be fun.

  * * *

  It’s not long before we are all anticipating Easter, and by anticipating, I mean baking. This time of year, we bake bread and more bread. Mama’s Easter bread is a braided wreath with hard-boiled eggs in the braid. We also bake “dolls,” braided bread wrapped around a hard-boiled egg to look like a baby in a blanket. Those are for Giulia’s girls. Mama bakes enough for us, for Marchettis, for Giulia’s family, for Izzy’s grown children, for just about everyone we know who isn’t doing the same thing themselves.

  The breads are works of art. It’s almost hard for me to watch Marcello and Lindo rip into them after all of that hard work, but that’s why Mama makes them. We’ll eat them on Easter Sunday with frittata—the heavy casserole of eggs, soppresatta, sausage, ricotta, and other cheeses that everyone looks forward to after Easter mass.

  Today, however, is Good Friday, and Mama and I won’t be baking at all. We are all going to the Good Friday service. Pa and the boys will meet us. Sara is coming with us, so Mama and I are walking to her house first.

  “Mama, why did Jesus have to die on the cross?”

  “He died for our sins. You know that.”

  “I know that, but I don’t understand why. Couldn’t God have just forgiven us all individually? As long as we said we were sorry?”

  “It’s not just forgiveness, Carolina. He opened heaven for us.”

  “But how, Mama? How does killing Jesus take sin away from us?”

  “Because he’s sinless, perfect. Just like the sacrificial lamb in the Passover meal.”

  “Did it have to be crucifixion? Do you think he could have died another way?”

  “I think that there had to be His blood.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the blood is what is holy, what gives us salvation.”

  “How?”

  “Enough! Do I look like St. Peter to you? Too many questions—you’re wearing me down!”

  “I need to ask Sr. Norbert these things.”

  “I think you do.”

  We are standing in front of Sara’s house, and I can see her wave to Mama from the window. All of our houses look shabby, but her house is really in disrepair. I hope that Mr. Marchetti will be true to his word and help her this spring. If Luca doesn’t return, something will have to be done. The porch roof is about to collapse.

  Good Friday service lasts for a couple of hours. At the collection, the basket is passed, and I can see that there are as many buttons as there are coins in it. After communion, we make our way through the pews again to take turns kissing the cross. There are about twenty-five pots of “la gran” on the steps of the altar, awaiting Father Vecchio’s verdict. Each Easter, the congregation is invited to participate in a wheat-growing contest. Jesus as the Bread of Life, I guess. Pa’s is probably the tallest—he has a special formula he uses to fertilize the soil. But there is another pot of tall grain that will give him stiff competition this year. While I am kneeling and waiting for our pew to stand, I watch the other people take communion, and then I shift my attention to the Stations of the Cross.

  The choir is singing “Crux Fidelis.” I must have looked at these stations a hundred times but have never really given them careful thought. There are the scenes of Christ’s three falls, of Veronica and the veil, of the soldiers removing his robe. Simon helps Jesus to carry the cross at the fifth station, and at the eighth station, Jesus speaks to the faithful women of Jerusalem. In the last four, He is nailed to the cross, dies, is taken down, and is entombed. It takes me a while to remember what each one is. But it’s the fourth station—Jesus meeting his mother—that holds my attention.

  I’ve gone to mass all of my sixteen years, but I never really thought about this before. In His pain and in His humiliation, Mary was there. She had to watch as others beat and abuse him. She had to watch as He struggled to carry the cross that He would
hang on. As I looked at her agonized face, I thought of Mama and Giova. It would have been like Mama watching people kill Giova. My God. I never realized.

  In the thirteenth station, Mary holds Christ’s battered body in her arms. I have heard her called “Our Lady of Sorrow” many times. I don’t know why, today, I am waking up to what that means. This image reminds me of Mama crying over Maria Luisa. It reminds me of Nicoletta’s sorrow for her husband, of Mr. Marchetti’s sorrow for his wife, of Sara’s sorrow for her unborn babies. I brush my hand over my medal. Again, I can’t help but wonder. Why was it necessary for Jesus to die this way? Why was it necessary for Mary to suffer? There must be more to this that I don’t understand. Father calls it the “mystery of faith.” It’s certainly a mystery to me.

  On the way home, I don’t say much. Mama and Sara are walking ahead. These days, Sara has a slight limp. It might not be noticeable to someone who doesn’t know her, but to me, it is a reminder of the hardship of her life and the reality of her physical condition.

  “There’s a cardinal,” says Sara, spying the little bird on a window sill.

  “Spring is really coming,” says Mama. “That reminds me of a story. My grandmother would always say that the cardinal is red because he dipped himself in the precious blood of Jesus.”

  “And this is Good Friday, and here he is to remind us!” says Sara in wonder.

  What I see is a cardinal, made red from the beginning. I wonder at the faith of Mama and of Sara. It’s simple. They accept without question. How I wish it were that simple for me.

  Dear Diary, April 4, 1926

  Jesus died on the cross to save me from sin. Now I have to figure out what that actually means. If Jesus is also God incarnate, then God died on the cross. God suffered for us. God suffered, so we can expect to suffer. Is that it? Mary suffered. Why? Was it to show us that there is nothing here we can endure that they haven’t suffered as well? Is it to show us how great a love He has that He would endure anything for us? But what if we don’t want Him to endure those things? Do our sins really put Christ on a cross? How? Death came through sin, says Father Vecchio. I can’t help but wonder how that works. Doesn’t anyone wonder these things in church? How do they get it, and I don’t?

  * * *

  On a warm day in May, Papa and I are working in the garden. It feels so good to be in the sun. Sometimes I just stop and put my face up to it, closing my eyes and soaking it in.

  “Hey, bathing beauty,” says Papa, “let’s get working on these tomato plants. I want to try three different kinds this year—beefsteak, roma, and the little cherry tomatoes. I’ll dig the holes, and you put the plants in and cover them up.”

  There are three different kinds, but there are at least fifteen plants total. I’m basically crawling on my knees from plant to plant.

  “So what do we think of our Pirates this year, figlia? Are they going to make it to the World Series again?”

  “I hope so, Papa. But the way they’re playing now, I don’t see it happening.”

  “Hey, you are reading the sports pages!”

  “Sure, I am. And I understand the game when you and Giova listen on the radio. Seems like every time they win a game, the next game they lose.”

  “And every time they lose, the next time they win,” adds Pa. “They’re almost split right now for wins and losses.”

  Papa is still digging, and I’m still crawling. Giova and Giuseppe are working—if they are telling the truth—and the little boys are off playing somewhere. I don’t mind this work, though. I like having a chance to talk with Pa and to take a break from the kitchen work.

  “What are you learning from the good sister these days?”

  “She wants me to write her a composition.”

  “What’s the topic?”

  “‘What it means to live in a democratic society.’ I don’t feel like writing it.”

  “Why not? You like your lessons, I thought.”

  “I usually like them, but this is not a topic I’m interested in. I don’t know what to write.”

  “You don’t know what to write because you haven’t lived somewhere else—somewhere like Italy, where Mussolini tells you what to say and what to think and what to write. Say that in a democratic society, we have freedom to make choices and to speak our minds. Say that in a country like this, someone like your old papa, a peasant, can have a son who becomes a judge, a doctor, an architect—anything he wants. No one is limited by what his father was. That’s a democratic society.”

  I wasn’t expecting that little speech from Papa, but I think it was also a reprimand. It meant a lot to him to come here, to gain his citizenship, and he’s done well. He has a house, he feeds his family, and he is respected at work. I guess that Giova and I don’t appreciate what his life was like in Italy, and how much courage it took for him to come here, not even knowing the language. I guess it frustrates Papa that we take for granted the things he had to work so hard for—the things he had to travel so far to find.

  “What about your daughter, Papa? Can she be anything she wants to be?”

  I can see I’ve put him on the spot a bit. “What do you want to be, figlia?”

  “I don’t know, Papa. What can I be but a mama?”

  “Your mama keeps our house running. She feeds us, takes care of all of us. That’s the noblest profession there is.”

  “I know, Papa,” I sigh, “but it sure would be nice to have a choice. My brothers will have a choice. I will have one path.”

  “Hey, no long faces. Who knows—maybe I’m talking to President Costandini right now! The first woman president!”

  We both laugh. I don’t really want to dwell on the negative. It’s too beautiful a day to ruin it. But I know that he’s kidding to cover up the truth—that my future has only one path.

  Dear Diary, May 22, 1926

  What would it be like to be a boy in this family? If I were Lindo and Marcello, I’d play all day and get dirty. If I were Giova, I’d go to work, smoke cigarettes, shoot dice with the other young men, come and go as I please, and bring home my own paycheck. If I were Pa, I’d sit in my armchair every night with my pipe and my coffee, and Mama would wait on me like a king. But I’m Carolina, the only daughter of the Costandini family. So today I will sew, cook, and clean. And tomorrow, I will do the same. But unlike Mama, I will never love it, and I will never be satisfied with it. I wish there were more to this life.

  * * *

  At dinner that night, Giova is bursting with news about the Sacco and Vanzetti case. Like every Italian in Sharpsburg, we have followed the case carefully, but there hasn’t been any news for a while. Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti have been in jail for six years now, awaiting execution for the murder of a payroll clerk and guard in Massachusetts. No one in Sharpsburg—certainly no Italian—believes that they are guilty. In fact, the case has been terrifying to all Italians because this could happen to anyone of us, especially those who don’t know how to speak English well.

  “The Evening Press says that there has been a confession, and the lawyers are making a motion for a new trial,” he says. Giova’s eyes are sparkling, and he’s speaking quickly. I can tell that’s he’s full of hope.

  “What does that mean?” asks Mama. She wants to be hopeful as well, but she isn’t sure if Giova has given her enough reason.

  “It means that they’ll have a new trial, and God willing, they will be released,” says Pa.

  “Don’t count on it,” says Giova, in spite of the fact that I know he is hopeful as well.

  “Why do you say that?” Pa asks. He looks disappointed.

  “Because this country, this justice system, discriminates against laborers, against immigrants, and against radicals. Sacco and Vanzetti are all three.”

  “How do you know so much?” asks Pa. I can tell he suspects something.

  “Because Giuseppe and I attend meetings. Political meetings.”

  “What kind of political meetings?” asks Pa, and I can tell th
at he is getting angry.

  “We go to meetings that support Tresca and his work.”

  “You mean anarchists.”

  “Anarchists, but also labor organizers. They make sense, Papa. Why should we be making $9 a week when the company heads are making millions?”

  Pa looks straight at Giuseppe and in Italian asks him if he is responsible for this. I have never ever seen Papa be angry toward Giuseppe, and I wish that this was not happening at the dinner table, in front of me and Mama.

  “I started it,” interrupts Giova. “Are you blind, Papa? This country pretends to have justice. It’s a justice based on favoritism. And we are getting the short end of the stick.”

  “All that is needed to free these men is for the jury to feel that there is reasonable doubt. That means,” explains Papa, “that they don’t need to believe Sacco and Vanzetti are definitely innocent. They only have to believe that there is a chance that they are innocent. The confession should be enough to cast doubt, Italian or not. Radical or not.

  What is the anarchist response—bombings! Thanks to the bombing of Wall Street six years ago, and thanks to the bombings that have happened since, Italians are seen as violent people. Do you think that impression helps Sacco and Vanzetti?”

  Pa has said all of that in Italian so that Giuseppe could fully understand him. Now Giuseppe has come to bat. He tells Pa that back in Italy, Malatesta is a hero and an anarchist. Malatesta, he says, believes we have to struggle against the government to conquer as much freedom as possible for all.

  “And how do bombings fit into that?” Pa asks him in Italian.

  Giuseppe tells him that Malatesta says that violence is always justified against the boss, against the oppressor, even if it demands human suffering. Malatesta claims that we have to make the most economical use of that suffering.

  “Giuseppe, may your mother never hear those words from your mouth. There is no ‘economical’ measure of suffering. There is no justification for killing innocent people—not even one! I’m telling you both now, there will be no more talk of anarchy in this house. And there will be no more meetings. Is that understood?” Pa’s talking so fast in Italian that I can hardly follow him.