|
EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK:
MOST PEOPLE TALK BULLSHIT:
One Primate's Search For Intelligent Life
(EXODUS)
Little Sal Gets All Warm
and Cozy With Me
I went over to see if Apollonia was home. I knocked on the front
door and rang the bell a few times. I was getting ready to leave
when I heard someone on the other side of the door. I could tell
someone was looking through the peephole.
The door swung open and, instead of Apollonia, it was Little Sal
who answered the door. I felt instant dread. Sal, however,
appeared glad to see me.
He reached out and put his hand on my shoulder, “Yo Vinny, how
you doen? Good to see you. Come in.” Once he let me in, he took
me through the door to the giant pantry that led to the rest of
the house.
He said, “Everyone is running errands, so it’s just me for an
hour or so, until Naz and the rest of the family gets back.
Apolliania is with her mother and Grand Mama.” He smiled.
His
smile looked genuine, just the type a shark would give to one of
its confederates before turning its predatory attentions back on
the world.
With this image in my mind, I thought, “I’ve got to get my
imagination and anxiety under control.”
He directed me to sit at the breakfast bar. “I was just
reheating some of Alicia’s pasta and sausage as a little pick me
up” He pulled out an extra plate and spilled a heaping portion
of pasta onto it and added several spicy Italian sausages. He
placed one of the plates before me. Next, he set a healthy salad
with the rest of the meal. I made a feeble attempt to protest
that I wasn’t hungry.
He waved one of his hands, dismissing my protest, “Hey, you
gotta eat…you’re a young man who is still growing.” He clapped
my shoulder. “How else you are going to keep your strength up for the
ladies?” He smiled and winked as the large scar on his face
wriggled and darkened from the effort. I ate in silence while
Little Sal made an occasional comment. I could tell that he was
trying his best to put me at ease. He even seemed to genuinely
like me.
“How are you and my niece getting along?” he queried.
“Real good,” I said, trying to suppress my re-emerging anxiety.
He leaned in and stretched his jaw towards me, “Do you think you
and Apollonia will have a future together?”
I started to stammer, “I’m just taking it one day at a time… for
now.”
Sal looked up me with his unsettling appraising eyes and pointed
to a picture on top of a China cabinet, “You remind Naz… all of
us really, of David…his son. Confused, I shook my head, “I
didn’t know that he had a son.”
I looked over at the picture. I had to admit that the boy did
look vaguely like a younger version of me.
Sal looked mournful as he forked his salad around, “David died
five years ago; he was hit by a car when he was crossing the
street. The guy was drunk and ran a stop sign. We were all
pretty broken up.”
I was tongue-tied. Finally I said, “I’m…I’m so sorry.”
A sound exhales from his lips, a sound of almost unbearable
pain, “Hey, that’s just life kid,” Sal lamented.
Sal leaned back and sipped his wine, “You like working blue
collar for the
Federal Government?”
I was startled that he knew what I did for the government, but
even more I was glad to be off the subject of poor David, “Yeah, sure, I like
the blue collar stuff, like working out on the docks, checking
out all of the cargo and stuff that comes in and out of the
docks. It’s real physical, which is right up my alley.”
Sal looks at me again with his chilling eyes, “Yeah…well that’s
good, but if you ever want to do something else… Naz can get you
hooked into a job or business if you want. You seem like a real
go-getter and I bet you got a good head on your shoulders.”
I was really embarrassed and uneasy as I stuttered, “I…I like
to…think that I put out my best.”
Sal laughed, “Don’t worry about it kid. I’m just saying that if
you want to better your situation, Naz or one of us could get
you into something.” He smiled slyly, winked and crooned, “Now,
if you and Apollonia ever tie the knot, your future will be
assured.” He looks at me more pointedly. “You capesse?”
I nodded my head and then I started to choke on my food.
Suddenly Mr. Fabaini and Apollonia came through the pantry door.
Apollonia ran over and gave me a hug and kiss, keeping her arm
around my shoulders, as I got ready to get up and greet her
father.
Mr. Fabaini waved me back in the seat, “Sit… sit, eat.”
He came over and patted me on the shoulder. “How you doen Vinny?
You’re looking good.” I fumbled out a thank you.
Sal said, “I thought Apollonia was with Alicia and Grand Mama
all day?”
She was, but the four of us had dinner together to celebrate,
and then Alicia took Mama over to Antonio’s house. Papa and the
rest of the crew are hanging out there.”
Little Sal looked back and forth at both Mr. Fabaini & Apollonia,
“Well?”
Apollonia laugh was musical, “Well what, Uncle Sal?”
Sal laughed and said, “Well…what was the celebration all about?”
Naz put his arm around his daughter and beamed with pride. “My
little girl has signed up to go to Mother Cabrini College next
year.”
Sal slapped the table with violent joy, startling the hell out
of me, “Madonna, I forgot!”
Apollonia's father smiled at me and shook my shoulder, “Since
the college is in Radnor, you two lovebirds will still get lots
of opportunity to see each other.”
I felt both flattered and squeezed in. I stayed for a few hours
longer just chit-chatting with Sal, Mr. Fabaini, and Apollonia.
I couldn’t help but compare how Mr. Granite had made me feel
uneasy because I had not measured up and now I was feeling
uneasy because Mr. Fabaini’s family was practically setting a
wedding date. Sal was as friendly as he could be, but to tell
the truth, he scared me more than Mr. Granite.
Later, I talked again with Jack Bozeni and some of the other
people in my neighborhood about my mixed feelings concerning
Apollonia and her family. I felt both a strong desire to pursue
her to the exclusion of all other women and the desire to bond
with a family that would take me in with open arms. I would at
last have the tight knit family unit I had always craved. I also
felt terror of commitment to her and her family. I felt uneasy
for reasons I could not put my finger on.
I mentioned that I had found out about Apollonia’s dead brother.
Jack said, “Yeah, Mr. Fabaini was in his house when he heard the
crash. He ran outside to get to David and when the drunk came
over to apologize, Mr. Fabaini went nuts and started to beat the
crap out of him. He beat him so badly that the guy had to be
hospitalized. He probably would have beaten him to death if the
police hadn’t arrived on the scene. They took him in, but he was
released on bail.”
I whistled, “Whoa, my God! What happened…did Mr. Fabaini have to
go to jail?”
One of the other guys who was with Jack said, “No, he got off
with a suspended sentence, but there was talk that the guy had
filed a civil suit against Mr. Fabaini.”
Curious I asked, “What happened with that?”
“It’s rumored that when the guy found out who he had filed suit
against, he dropped it,” smirked Jack.
Jack leaned in and lowered his voice, “The guy was so scared
that he decided it was best to move out-of-states and put his
house up for sale.”
Another guy joined in, “Yeah, but the guy never enjoyed the
money from the sale.”
“What are you saying,” I asked?
Jack grimaced. “While Mr. Fabaini and his family were in the
Bahamas, the guy disappeared…never to be found again. His wife
didn’t have to share the money from the sale.”
The beer I had been sipping took on a very sour taste.
“Did the police look into it?”
“Sure, but what can they do? He just disappeared,” said Jack’s
friend.
Jack hissed, “The rumor is that Little Sal and his two nephews
kidnapped the guy and disposed of the body.”
My anxiety about deflowering Apollonia went to another level.
Later that night, I had a bad dream. Little Sal and his nephews
were showing me a wood chipper and telling me that was my fate
if I disappointed Apollonia. In the dream, I felt real terror.
Sal and his nephews smiled with menacing humor. “That’s just
life, kid,” crooned Little Sal.
I woke up yelling, “No!” My body was drenched in cold clammy
sweat. I had no desire to sleep with the fishes.
That’s right, I have no desire to take a premature dirt nap or
sleep with the fishes. Look the truth is…there is not such thing
as the Mafia or Costa Nostra! It’s all a myth! Organized crime
does not exist outside of government affairs, except they aren’t
organized. If you don’t believe me just ask New York’s former
Governor Mario Cumo.
I made
up the whole story about Mr. Fabaini and Apollonia! All
Italian-Americans are one hundred percent honest hard working
people.
Honestly? I think that all the people who talked this shit about
Mr. Fabaini had over-active imaginations and some sort of
invested desire to feel that in some vague way we are connected
to underworld figures—or knew someone who was. I also believe a
lot of rumors get started and then bandied, so a local urban
legend is born, nurtured, and fostered. I believe that it was
the fear, and over imaginings of many of the people I had talked
to, that projected on me the anxiety and drama they expressed.
There is also the undeniable fact that many Italian-Americans
have an overweening fascination with the movie “The Godfather."
I think all of this happened even though I never suspected or
believed Mr. Fabaini or anyone one in his family was associated
with any illegal activities.
I believe that my anxiety had mostly to do with the influence
Jack Bozeni and the others had projected and my own guilt about
wanting to deflower and sully Apollonia. I felt the guilt and
pressure from her family and my own inner voice, the one I
sometimes bury so deep that I am tempted to ignore what is
right. In my heart of hearts, I realized that as far as
Apollonia was concerned, having sex with her outside of wedlock
would have truly been wrong for her and it would have dishonored
her family, regardless how much a passionate firecracker
Apollonia was with me.
I acknowledge all this was complicated by the war being waged
within me between my own personal Mr. Hyde and the part that
knew how I should be, regarding her and her family.
I must admit, however the allegations Mr. Fabaini beat up the
driver that killed his son, I can neither confirm nor deny, nor
that the driver was kidnapped, killed and disposed of. The fact
the guy actually just disappeared—again I cannot confirm or
deny. In all sincerity, I can’t bring myself to believe that one
of the warmest human beings I have ever had the good fortune of
meeting would be capable of such an act. I can accept I have a
greater likelihood of acting in a less than saintly manner if
something threatened someone from my family. That is my flaw. I
don’t believe that Mr. Fabaini is so flawed. If he was, I can
certainly understand what could drive a person to revenge, even
murder. However, I must also admit, Little Sal did scare the
hell out of me. That’s all I have to say about this subject. It
is closed now and forever.
Let’s hope plausible denial works.
MOST PEOPLE TALK BULLSHIT:
One Primate's Search For Intelligent Life
(GENESIS)
MOST PEOPLE TALK BULLSHIT:
One Primate's Search For Intelligent Life
(REVELATIONS)
MOST PEOPLE TALK BULLSHIT:
One Primate's Search For Intelligent Life
(JUDGMENT DAY)
THE MARINES: GOD'S CHOSEN
WARRIORS
VINCE'S GYM
ADVENTURES IN MARINE BIOLOGY
CONVERSATIONS WITH NEO
NEO TEACHES ME THE ART OF WAR
& PEACE;
His Version of The Matrix
MEMORIES OF MY FATHERS
ZEN & THE ART OF RESISTANCE
TRAINING:
A Yogic & Scientific Approach To Weight
Lifting
ZEN & THE BIOLOGY OF
TRANSCENDENCE:
The First Matrix of Psychic
Phenomena
ZEN & THE ART OF KINESIOLOGY:
The Yogic & Scientific
Approach To Movement
ZEN & YOUR ENERGY SYSTEMS
ZEN & VARIOUS ASPECTS OF
TRAINING
HOMEPAGE TO MOST PEOPLE TALK BULLSHIT:
One Primate's Search For Intelligent Life
(EXODUS)
HOMEPAGE |
