KEY WEST LOU / HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOUIS

Happy birthday, Louis! Eighty nine years old. Born July 6, 1935.

It has been a trip! Can’t complain. Just hope it continues and in relatively good health.

This past year was not the best, however. A heart attack, 5 1/2 weeks at Mount Sinai Hospital in Miami, three heart surgeries. I am recovered/recovering. Never sure. Doctors keep testing me.

About two weeks ago, I learned from two of my local physicians who are my primary care givers that they thought I was not going to make it. Glad I surprised them. In the lengthy period I was at Mount Sinai, I did on two occasions think I was going to die. Briefly, a few hours at a time. I knew I was hospitalized too long and there always seemed to be something else, of a minor nature fortunately, that popped up.

Whatever, I am still here and hope to be here for many years to come.

Let’s get back to July 6, 1935 and my mother.

She told me several times she labored 26 hours. No air conditioning in those days. The humidity was horrendous. I took my time to arrive to her distress.

When one gets to my age and has recently gone through a possible death situation, you think of many things.

One involves my mother. What I am about to share I always knew. I have thought about her more these past months. My mother was my best friend. Without question.

She was the last of 8 children born to her parents. The first 7 were boys. Finally, they had a girl! They named my mother Fortunata. Italian for Fortune. Understandable. My mother was born in Foggia, Italy.

She came to the United States at an early age. The family settled in New York City. Typical Italian immigrants at the time. No money. My mother only went through the third grade. At the age of 8, she was forced to quit and went to work full time in a shoe factory. The end of formal education for her.

Let’s move ahead. She and her family at some point moved to Utica. Her father became somewhat successful. At one point, he owned a whole block of commercial real estate on James Street. Success did not last long. The Depression came and a stroke for my grandfather with it. The end of economic success.

At some point, my mother and father met and married. From everything I have gathered, my arrival made both of them happy. My mother recovered rapidly from the birth hospital. My father reportedly ran up and down Jay Street where we lived initially, shouting to everyone that he had a son.

I was not that fond of my mother while in grammar school and high school. She always thought I was doing something wrong. Punishment a daily occurrence. Many the spaghetti bowl and large wooden forks and spoons that were broken over my head.  There were days I did not think I would survive. It was a daily race around the dining room table. She only a few feet behind me.

I used to tell this story in later years around the dinner table on occasion during a holiday. My mother would adamantly deny abusing me thusly. I soon learned to be quiet about it. As an adult I thought the beatings were funny, she did not.

Many of my contemporary friends were Italian males my age. Occasionally one of us would bring up the topic of mother beatings in our earlier days. Most, if not all, experienced it. Probably all. I cannot recall clearly at the moment. The beatings obviously an Italian thing.

I was in college and going out regularly with Mary Lourdes. We wanted to get married. Neither us nor our parents had any money. Not only did we want to get married, our game plan was I would go on to law school immediately following marriage.

We were not too bright.

My mother was a wise woman. Innate. She had to have been born with the intelligence she possessed. She told me not to marry Mary Lourdes. I did. She reminded me a few times in later years the mistake I had made. Nevertheless, the two got along very well all the time. Looked out for each other. I doubt my wife was ever aware of the negative feelings my mother had for her.

My mother and I developed a unique relationship. Several evenings a week, I would stop of at her house on my way home from the office. We only lived two mils apart. She was always waiting for me. Seated at the kitchen table. A bottle of Beefeaters and a glass of ice on the table. One glass only. My mother did not drink.

We would sit and chat. I would share my work and personal problems with her. She was intuitive and smart. Her advice sage.

These on the way home from work kitchen table meetings memorable events.

My mother passed on many years ago. She was a diabetic who did not take care of herself.

She had been in the hospital 2 days undergoing all kinds of tests after passing out at home. Lisa and I drove to the hospital together the morning of the second day. I had been to the hospital the evening before. My mother was seated on the side of her bed shaking her legs. She was alive and vibrant. No concern at that time she might die.

I wanted to stop for breakfast first. Lisa wanted to go directly to the hospital. We stopped for breakfast.

Her doctor came out of her room as we were walking towards it. He told Lisa and I she had just died.

I believe Lisa has never forgotten I denied her grandmother her presence at the moment of her death. She forgets I inadvertently denied myself also.

Whatever, the story of the woman who gave birth to me and me. Our relationship. I think about it often.

Hope I can write again when I am 90 next year at this time. Better stated, I hope I am alive and 90 next year at this time.

Enjoy my birthday! Have a drink to Louis and his mother!

[livemarket market_name="KONK Life LiveMarket" limit=3 category=“” show_signup=0 show_more=0]