Italian kids around the world have grown up with these tiny juice bottles (125ml/4.2 oz)  I can remember going to the “bar” with my father and the barista would bring my father an espresso and me a “succo di frutta.”  I always asked for it in the bottle because it was fun to drink out of.  It was so much better than any “American Juice”  that my mother bought at the grocery store.  It still brings back great memories and whenever I see it, I can’t help but buy one.

My favorite is Pera (Pear)… what’s yours?

Like many small Italian towns, San Michele, a small village in Calabria (provincia di Catanzaro) is a shadow of what it used to be. We often joke that the sheep and chickens outnumber the people and since I estimate there are 20-30 permanent residence that currently live there, it’s more than likely. It swells slightly in summer as people return to their family homes for vacation. My father was born there in 1950 and left in 1968 for greener pastures, like many of his family and friends.

A large group gathers on the church steps in San Michele (Date and photographer unknown)

Summer Afternoons:
The clock in the piazza would toll every 15 minutes and tell all who heard it the time. Each deep toll would mark the hour and each higher pitched toll marked increments of 15 minutes. This happened day and night 365 and as you can imagine 12:45 was annoying. I would wake from my afternoon nap, walk up the street past the piazza and glare at the clock tower with a look that clearly expressed my thought (stupid clock tower.) I vividly remember the scene of Italian men playing cards as I entered the town’s only bar. The room with cement walls and tiled floor was a cool retreat from the summer sun and there was always a chance that one of dad’s childhood friends or cousins would recognize me, and instruct the barista to get me a gelato of my choice. There was a colorful picture menu of the gelato selection on the wall, most were 200 lire but the good ones were 500. Beyond the chatter of the smoke filled card room and past the pinball machine was a back door that led outside to the bar’s bocce court where I would find the real action. I would carefully and quietly enter, find a spot on the bocce court wall and crouch down to watch. It was a completely different world to me. The fig trees created a boarder around the court and beyond them were walls, so that the only entrance was the only exit. The vegetation among the figs was allowed to grow at will. To me it seemed like a small jungle as I watched the lizards pop in and out of cracks and holes looking for a sun spot. Figs and fig leaves were scattered on the playing surface and would become part of the game as clearing them would only take time that no one seemed to have. The smell of cigarettes would mingle with those of flowers and herbs from beyond the walls and bestemmie would fly from the mouths of unhappy players. The bocce balls would make a loud crack as they slammed each other or the wooden boards that formed the boarder of the court, and teammates would give unsolicited advice on what each should do with their remaining balls. I would examine each player, how they looked, how they played, who they might be…. a cousin or a friend and then wonder how many times they played there before. After a few rounds however, I would bore…. maybe I’ll head to the piazza to see if there’s anyone to play with. I hope I get a gelato on the way out.

A photo from the window of my father’s family home (circa 1987)

So, my birth name is Peppino. However, everyone calls me Joe including my parents, who have always called me Joe. Let me try to explain this. Peppino is a nickname of Giuseppe and Giuseppe of course is Joseph in English. Nicknames of Giuseppe would be: Peppe, Peppino, Peppone, etc. “-ino” meaning little, “-one” meaning big. This goes for other words in the Italian language as well: bacino = small kiss, bacione = big kiss. So Joe or “little Joe” isn’t really a far stretch from Peppino…. however, sometimes difficult to explain to anyone who isn’t Italian. The first day of school each year was always fun… but not really. Then there was my 3rd grade teacher who would make me write Peppino 100 times for ever time I submitted work with “Joe” on it. I didn’t see many recesses in 3rd grade and as you can imagine, I didn’t like her very much.