He Hasn't Really Left

Yesterday I was heartbroken to hear the news from my friend Ericka Lutz that her husband Bill Sonnenschein had passed away suddenly while in Madagascar. I've been working with Ericka on her Red Diaper Dharma column for quite some time now, and, like so many Literary Mama readers, I always look forward to the next exciting installment. Her most recent piece, "Holding", described so beautifully how she had been coping with the "situational separation" of having Bill work thousands of miles away. These lines, so touching when I first read them a few weeks ago, are especially moving now:

Yet Bill hasn't really left. Our love is strong, our commitment unbroken. We talk on Skype almost every day, and in between, we email and Twitter. We're still together, we love each other, and this is temporary. He hasn't really left, he's just not here right now.

When someone dies, you search for the right words to comfort. You tell her you're sorry, then offer any help you can. But you can also offer up her own wisdom: He hasn't really left, he's just not here right now.

Hope Your Christmas Was Sweet

This time of year I alway think back to Christmases spent at the house on August Avenue, at the home of my maternal grandparents. A house with so many levels and so many nooks and crannies to explore. Like many Italians we celebrated (and still do) on Christmas Eve (something the Bambina has taken to calling Christmas Eid -- I cannot correct her, it's that cute.) After a ginormous meal, the kids would run wild while the adults played a card game called Bestia. We'd all stay up until midnight to open gifts (except the odd cousin passed out in the middle of the living room floor.) Then we'd go to our respective homes to open more gifts -- from our parents. So Christmas Day was actually very restful for everyone. We ate leftovers and played with our toys.

And today was the same. Along with my mom's lasagna and turkey, we've eaten quite a few of my sister C's shortbread and biscotti, not to mention the quintessential Sicilian fig cookies. The Bambina, royally spoiled for both holidays, might just need her own wing in the house for all her new gear.

Pictured Above -- Homemade Torrone, Sicilian fig cookies and many other goodies.

Michelle Alfano's Made Up of Arias

This past Tuesday I took part in the Toronto launch of my friend Michelle Alfano’s novella Made Up of Arias (Blaurock Press, 2008).

The venue was elegant and chic – the upper lounge of the Globe Bistro in the heart of Greektown. I got there a bit early and met Michelle for the first time face to face after so many months of emailing and posting comments on each other’s blogs. She immediately said “But you’re a baby”, and I laughed, thinking, “The lighting is just too good in this place.” We talked for a few minutes, exchanged gifts (the Bambina and I gave her chocolates, and Michelle gave me a double CD of tracks her hipster daughter J. had compiled for the launch). In those precious and anxious moments before the people began to arrive, I had a chance to chat with a woman who exudes so much warmth and vitality. I spied the neat stacks of her beautifully designed novella (cover art by Amber Albrecht) on the book table and, like the book publishing type that I am, immediately flipped to the back cover copy of one of them. There it was, a blurb from none other than that maverick of Italo-Canadian lit and two-time Governor General award-winner – Nino Ricci.

The night went by in a flash. Michelle’s friend, the poet Sandra Di Zio, read just before me. She seemed right at home in front of the crowd, making a few jokes, and then read some very lovely poems. I was nervous, and it showed, but afterwards people had a lot to say about the last poem I read, a new one called “Thirty-Nine Degrees”. I was glad I’d taken a chance on that one. I also sold a few of my chapbooks, Between O and V, and was thrilled to sign them. Then Michelle read. I knew she’d been nervous beforehand, but it didn’t show. Everyone gathered in close to listen to the part towards the end of the novella when the youngest sister Clara enacts Mimi’s death scene in La Bohème. We were charmed.

I've only just finished Made Up of Arias, after battling a series of weird cold and stress-related headaches this week. Of course I will be biased here. How can I not love a book that resonates so deeply with my own experiences? Here I am, first-generation Sicilian-Canadian, brought up in an Ontario ‘burb (not Hamilton, mind you, but it’s all the same, as far as I’m concerned) with a story in my hands that seems to be pulled from the pages of my own familial drama. There’s Opera. There’s a Dramatic Mother. Mischievous Siblings. Mocking of Macaroni and Cheese. TV. Catholic Guilt. Death. But amid this shared history, there's an original tale, told with great wit and humour, as well as tragedy. I am urging all my friends this season to treat themselves to a copy. Get Made Up of Arias here.

A Take-That Moment

I don't have too many of these moments in my life. I avoid confrontation. I usually dream up the winning comeback hours after an ugly encounter. But today, with the buffer of email, I pretty much told a potential client, "It's not me. It's you."

I listened to my gut, and I listened to my body. The headache I had all morning was not from a lingering cold that's being passed around the family, and it was not from a lack of caffeine or water. It was the prospect of working with someone sarcastic and condescending. Sure, it would have meant extra money for Christmas, but I'd be grouchy for the next few weeks. No thank you, we're fine.

National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women

Years ago, as a first-year Journalism student at Carleton University, I wrote an essay on the Montreal Massacre of 1989. I wish I could find that paper right now to gain some insight into how I'd interpreted the horrific event.

I wonder now about what could have been for the fourteen murdered engineering students -- all of them women -- especially the work they could be doing and the children they could be raising. I think too of the parents of those brilliant women, and how they are coping with this anniversary, nineteen years later.

Book Beauty: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

I just finished reading Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao. As I held the book closed in my hands for a few mystified moments, the meaning behind that red spatter across the front-cover type truly sunk in. From all I'd read and heard about it, I was prepared for a sad story about a wonderful guy, a guy I would actually miss. Even so, I still held on until the final pages for that lift. You know it, what all great writers do. It sounds hokey, but Díaz transcends with this book. And although I’d call this story horrific, tragic, and apocalyptic, it still contains so much beauty.