MY IMPROBABLE JOURNEY- Part Three - segment 1
a family of four, piano lessons and another dilemma...
Mother’s visits were always wonderful...quite simply because she was wonderful -always interested in new ways, customs, places, and foods. She was extremely adaptable/totally acceptable of our very different meal schedule.
Above all, she was loving and patient with the children and so very in tune with them. She was ecstatic, thrilled to see our growing family of four!
Mother’s Day 1977 with our newborn Michael
Mother’s Day 1977
While it was hard to see Marica cry so inconsolably when her dear Grandma left, she would have lifetime memories of their magical times together, of their unique bond! What an invaluable treasure is was to see how incredibly close they were.
Mother was more than generous, taking the long trip to us very often, usually staying a full month. She was so highly valued as Director of Nurses at the hospital where she worked that she was able to “dictate” the length and periods of her trips to us.
Nevertheless, how we wished we lived closer, the distance was enormous. Phone calls through Ital Cable were quite an ordeal: we needed to call an Ital Cable operator who asked for our number to call us back when there was a free line. It could easily be hours later - the delay so often pushing us into a too-late timeframe due to the nine-hour time difference. The calls were also extremely expensive and not of the best quality.
We mainly wrote long letters which reliably took only four days each way back and forth. Jumping with joy, Marica ran in - “it’s from Grandma - she wrote to me again - she sealed it with a lipstick kiss!” Marica loved checking the mailbox (that she painted with bright yellow happy faces) everyday after returning from school.
The envelopes were usually full of stickers, stars and badges for Marica’s chart. Each time Mother visited, she and Marica made a new chart together with new goals, dedicated to new English words, new piano pieces she learned, house chores she helped me with, her newly-earned Girl Scout badges and how many new books she read each week. Finding those letters in the mailbox was a maximum joy for Marica.
Marica’s end of year First Grade Report Card next to a pot of one of her favorite flowers on our front porch: fragrant freesias.
Michael was a happy baby, began sleeping through the night earlier than expected and was an excellent eater, always eager to try the new foods that I introduced from month to month. He was strong, vocal, expressive, very active - crawled around the house at record speed and took his first proud steps before his first birthday.
Marica loved being Big Sister. Seven years older, she was somewhat motherly and protective when she took him out in the garden.
Michael at 7 months with his loving big sister!
Marica was eager to begin piano lessons in second grade. We found a great teacher who came to the house for the fundamental introductory phase. We knew that the wrong teacher in the very beginning would have a terribly negative effect - we wanted her approach to be full of enthusiasm and encouragement.
And that is was! Anna Maria was exceptional - that Marica was in her element was obvious from the very beginning. She was a natural, progressed rapidly, loved playing...and was talented. Both grandmothers were talented musicians - she had it in her genes.
“There is way too much homework - and too difficult. All those exercises - I even had trouble doing them yesterday”, complained Claudio’s mother. Other mothers, one after another, agreed. Silent in the small group of mothers in the hallway as we waited our respective turns for our third grade parent-teacher meeting, I was soon asked if I agreed.
“I don’t know, is it? I don’t see or do the homework with Marica or check her workbook at all”, I said. The astonished faces made it quite clear that I was immediately branded a neglectful parent.
My emphasis on Marica being responsible, totally independent for her school work was heresy in this culture. I was shirking my duty. That conversation was the beginning of a certain palpable disapproval, a distinct distance I always felt with the other mothers. Mine was the lone voice - again, yet again, I was the odd one out.
So, here I was, faced anew with the my recurring dilemma: was this simply the familiar way, my usual, or was it truly preferable for Marica than this Italian way? For me, doing homework together would send a crystal clear message: “You need my help, you are not capable” which I strongly believed would create dependency and insecurity.
Italian mothers intentionally fostered dependency, they wanted to keep their children close, to clip their wings so that they wouldn’t “fly “.
My goal was the exact opposite!
So true I experienced similar trials, and being a teacher in an international school , noted the different parenting styles.