Uncle Joe

Uncle Joe

Brooklyn, New York 1963:

Uncle Joe was the only English-speaking adult in my family. His Italian vocabulary consisted of spaghetti, mozzarella, spumoni, and a few other words which were mostly curses and names of other Italian foods. As he proudly pronounced an Italian word he’d just learned, he would put his arm around the surliest adult in the room until that person cracked a smile.

Uncle Joe was a bus driver for the Greenline bus which ran from Brooklyn to Far Rockaway in New York City. He was married to my mother’s sister. They lived in the apartment below mine with their three children. I lived with my parents, grandparents, and brother. As the youngest, I was the only child home during school days. I spent most of my time in quiet imaginative play. Except for Uncle Joe and my Nonna, the adults in my life ignored me so I took to ignoring them. Most days they went to work or were busy with household tasks. Those were the quiet days.

Other days were saturated with voices that began loud but eventually escalated into screams. Eyes became daggers as words were hurled with venom.  Though my mother forgot to enroll me in kindergarten, my socialization lessons came amidst the frequent altercations between adults. Seeing where their quarrels led, I learned at a young age to keep my opinions to myself. 

Self-regulation was not a thing the adults in my young world practiced. Except for Uncle Joe, adults rode with their emotions like they were on a roller coaster. 

Take the day that, Sofia, a paesano (friend) sought refuge in my house.  I’d been watching for a rainbow that might appeared since it had just finished raining. 

I never saw a rainbow that day, but I felt the warm humid air bubbling and boiling outside and inside as I spotted her running towards our house. The grey pavement was still wet under the tree when she burst through the front gate and bound up our large red front stoop. Her white bun was disheveled. She wore a loose-fitting housedress under a navy-blue cardigan even though it was late May, and unusually warm that day.

I ran out to the small landing outside our apartment to watch as she ran up the long flight of stairs. She rushed past me, into our apartment, screaming and crying.

“Sta cercando di uccidermi!” Sofia yelled. Which means: She’s trying to kill me. 

My grandmother, who I called Nonni, had comfortable arms ready for anyone who needed a good cry. Sofia buried her head in Nonni’s large chest. She said that her daughter-in-law was mistreating her but never said exactly how or even why. 

“Se resto con lei un altro giorno saro morto,” she said as she blew her nose. That means; If I stay with her another day, I’ll be dead. 

I left them and went back to my post by the window. A large dark green car screeched to a stop on the black tar. Two men tore open the door and stomped onto the pavement. One opened the back door to let a frantic woman out. They all came through our front gate. Another car parked behind them releasing a ferocious crowd. The second car was black. I’d never seen so many cars parked out front. Usually only one or two cars came down the street on any given day. They rarely stopped in front of our house. 

I didn’t recognize anyone. Nonni, later told me that they’d all been neighbors in Italy.

The woman stomped up our steps and screamed, “Dov’ è lei?” Which means: Where is she?

“Puttana.” Sofia yelled when she saw the woman. That means whore.

“Cagna!” The whore yelled back. That means bitch. By the time I was five, I’d acquired quite a vocabulary.

 The two men were her sons, and the woman was her daughter-in-law.  I didn’t recognize any of the other people who crowded our apartment. It felt like the entire village of Rotondi in Italy swam across the ocean and showed up at our house that day. Everyone was screaming at once so that no one was heard until my grandfather screamed above them.

“Calmati!”  That means calm down.

Everyone stopped and stared at him for a split second before resuming. I saw his lips move as he yelled again but his voice became drowned out as everyone else yelled louder. 

No one in our family ever ignored my grandfather. That was like kissing death. If he yelled at you to stop. You stopped. No one ever dared cross him. Not even my father.  But he held no power over this crowd. 

After that split second pause which to me felt like an eternity, the old woman began to pull out her own hair. Her daughter-in-law mimicked her. The two stood there like mirror images making faces as they tore pieces of hair from their own scalp. Next, came the eruption of incoherent screams, fainting and mass hysteria. They pushed past my grandfather and piled into the back bedroom to where Nonni had navigated Sofia.

As they passed by me, all I saw was a herd of legs beneath skirts and trousers stomping repeatedly as they moved. I put my hands to my ears to drown out the sounds. 

            That was when I heard my uncle Joe running up the steps. He must have been dressing for work because he wore his dark grey pants but was only wearing his white sleeveless tea shirt. He stopped right behind where I stood watching the drama unfold. The scent of his Aqua Velva was a soothing balm. He looked down at me. I could see the worry in his eyes even though he was smiling at me. 

His black hair was still wet. He combed it back with his fingers as he looked from me to the mass hysteria then back again at me. He took out his white handkerchief and pat my tears before wiping the sweat off his brow. 

            “Madonna Mia!” He slapped his forehead. “What the hell happened?” I shrugged my shoulders. He motioned for me to stay back as he began walking into the crowd. At first, I stayed back but then ran to his side.

“Oh my God! It’s a crazy house.” He said as he put his arm around me. I slipped behind him and peeked out.

Spitting out saliva, the daughter in law waved her fingers as she bit her hand. For Southern Italians, that was a sign of ultimate anger. 

“You are so beautiful when you’re angry,” Uncle Joe said to her. She glanced at him sideways and resumed biting her hand. A man in the crowd shot him the evil eye. That was when Uncle Joe gave up trying to reason with anyone with the few Italian words he knew.

“Let’s get out of here!” He grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the apartment and down the stairs. Uncle Joe held onto me until we got to the bottom. “Quick, lets hide in here.” He led me into his apartment and pushed me under his bed. Every now and then he would peek under and giggle. 

“I’m sooo scared.”  Not only did he mimic Lou Costello with his voice, but he also looked a lot like him. Skinny arms and legs stuck out of his round belly. He always kept his straight black hair neatly trimmed and combed back.  When he got down on his hands and knees to see how I was doing, his face turned red, and his straight hair fell out of place.

 “My belly’s too big!” He handed me his white handkerchief. I wiped my tears and laughed as he tried to squeeze under the bed. He started singing silly songs, most of which I didn’t understand. Though I’d been born in America, my English was limited at the time. His gentle voice and kind eyes lulled me to sleep. I don’t know how long I stayed there under the bed before a stampede on the steps and doors slamming woke me. He peeked under the bed.

“I got to go to work, Bella,” he said. He called me that even though it’s not my name. It means beautiful. He could make anyone feel beautiful.  

“The crazy people went home,” he said. 

When I came out from under the bed, he’d already buttoned up his grey uniform shirt. He gave me a whole role of butterscotch before walking me to the foot of the steps. I hugged him and went back up.

The apartment was so quiet you could hear the clocks ticking again. An occasional muffled cry seeped out of the back bedroom. I found out later that Nonni had convinced them to let Sofia stay with us for a few days. Besides my uncle, she was the only one who didn’t raise her voice that day. When they’d finally quieted down, exhausted from screaming, she was able to convince them to let Sofia stay a few days until they could sort out their differences. Sofia never went back to her son’s house. She stayed with us until her family sent her back to Italy.

That day was both traumatic and educational. I learned that a significant amount of the adults in my life were nuts. I also learned how to get the hell out of the way thanks to my Uncle Joe.

Soon after that incident, he and his family moved out to Long Island. We didn’t own a car, but at least once a year, Uncle Joe would pick me up and take me to his house to spend a week or two. Those were the happiest weeks of my summers. 

Then, when I was 15, Uncle Joe succumbed to cancer. He was 49. 

The funeral parlor was bursting with passengers who rode on his bus every day. They traveled to Long Island to honor a man who made them laugh and who sang with them as they traveled to and from work. One man said that after he retired, he still rode with Joey every now and then just to talk to him and hear him sing. 

The day of his wake I stood outside and looked at a rainbow that had formed behind the funeral parlor. I knew that Uncle Joe sent it to let me know that he was okay.

The saying about only the good die young became real to me on the day he died. He left a legacy of love and laughter. He was truly an unsung hero who I will never forget.