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Subject: Nostalgia Kicking In
Date: May ".... I hope that your adventures in 'Spring' Cleaning have unearthed some more memories. I am very nostalgic and "black and white" (or bianco e nero as the Italians say). I appreciate living the life of an old soul. I prefer to wear a suit every day, envision myself only in sepia tone photographs and listen to Chet Baker often. I like my vodka without soda. And wish we would start calling wines from Bordeaux, Claret again. I prefer the landscapes and architecture of Europe to America because it still stands as it was 50, 60 years ago, or 5 or 6 centuries. But let's stop for a minute. America in the early half of last century was an amazing place. The Gilded Age of late 19th Century grew the country and the forming of Baseball leagues in many new cities brought competition amongst states and regions and the country came closer together as it grew farther apart. The first World War sent many of our great grandfather's abroad and brought back economic prosperity and the Jazz Age of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but also the Depression after the Great Crash of '29. Hard Times, almost in a Dickensian sense, ravaged the country and created the psychological "steel" that defines the American soul. A Second World War and we are united again in economic prosperity and post-war good times are had by all. Hollywood and Record companies brought us Screen Stars and Starlets and "American Idols" and everything was recorded and listened to by families who sat around the radio or the record player as the felt-wire needle scratched at the black plastic. The crack of the Baseball bat was the ever present sound of summer and children and adults went to the cinema to laugh at Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, smile with the Holiday films of Bing Crosby, cry at Jimmy Stewart's It's A Wonderful Life; sit shocked by the thrillers of Hitchcock, and be seduced by the innocence of Audrey Hepburn, the confidence of Kathryn Hepburn, the gaze of Lauren Bacall and the Grace of that girl called Kelly. I live in these days through my mind's eye every day. And when I am in New York, maybe I will get a job where I will wear a suit again every day and visit hotel bars and refurbished speak easy's and social clubs and drink vodka again, I don't know. Maybe I will move to Napa or Sonoma and live a pastoral life, farming grapes in the Alexander Vineyard and enjoy the slow and steady pace of the seasons. I am uncertain and scared of the future, but good Lord willing, things will work out. So, as you worry about slowing down and figuring it out, know that you are not alone. That somewhere, on the other side of the world will be there to write you about similar feelings and celebrate little victories. As always, my bestest! Before leaving Sicily, I had come come to add -issimo to just about every word, every day. It made the Sicilians feel special knowing that everything they say and do is considered part of that upper echelon of the world's best. Crazy Sicilians.
Post - May'06 Back to home...
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