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   Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:20 JST Robin DeRosa

   In the hospital with my dad and here are a few things he’s been telling me as he starts to regain some strength. He loves to tell me stories of his growing up. (Slow thread.)

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:08 JST Robin DeRosa

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     Hospitals can be so hard and disease and illness bring such struggle. But sitting bedside for family is weirdly something like a gift. These stories, this ancestry, the birth and dying and death and memory of it all. Something like a gift in the right light.

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:09 JST Robin DeRosa

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     My generation is named Robin, Peter, Linda, Lisa, Bobby, Matt, Jen, Andy, John.

     But both my brothers Peter and I picked our grandmother’s Italian names for our own kids’ middle names (his kid is Lucy Victoria and mine is Ruby Adeline).

     Mr. Bill repeated this.
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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:11 JST Robin DeRosa

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     Which also makes me think about immigration. All of my great-grandparents and a couple of my grandparents were born in Italy.

     My grandparents were named Adelina Tomasello, Victoria Montouri, Attilio Fiore, and Salvatore DeRosa. 🇮🇹

     But they were all so excited about becoming American, and they wanted their kids to speak English.

     They named their kids Paula, Joe, Betty, Carol, and Bob. 🇺🇸

     Mr. Bill repeated this.
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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:12 JST Robin DeRosa

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     Which is also funny because if you remember Leno from the next bed over (previous thread), he’s had three nephews visit over the last two days and all three are named Joseph!

     The Italians love our Josephs.

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:13 JST Robin DeRosa

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     On St. Joseph’s Day, my great-grandmother would make Zeppoles (Italian cookie thing) and would not let anyone eat any until my dad came by for them, because his name was Joseph.

     Though then he clarified that it was him or his three cousins, because they were all named Joseph. 🤣

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:14 JST Robin DeRosa

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     My great grandmother who had the pigeon also had chickens. In an apartment in Boston. When it was Easter, she gave my dad a basket of baby chicks. My dad lived in an apartment in Medford. I said, “What the heck did you do with a basket of chicks in the middle of the city?” He said, “I took them home and loved them until one by one they died and I cried.”

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:15 JST Robin DeRosa

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     My dad’s dad, my grandpa, was one of eight kids. They were raised in the North End in Boston by a single mom, my great grandmother. Every morning the eight kids would get up and whoever got up first got the shoes for the day.

     I don’t know if that’s true but my dad swears it wasn’t told as a joke.

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:16 JST Robin DeRosa

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     My dad was a scrawny little kid and had no muscle or intimidation cred. He said most customers were just glad that they only had to give a few bucks to a kid. But he said he was afraid someone would beat him up for asking for their money.

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:17 JST Robin DeRosa

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     My dad’s father had his station wagon repossesed, and that was the only car they had for the family business. My dad was about 14. In order to get the money to get the car back, he went to customers who had taken delivery of rebuilt carburetors from his dad but hadn’t paid their bill. Most of them were broke too. But he collected whatever he could from them in 5 and 10 dollar bills and it took all day on foot and by bus. And he got enough to get the car back for a month.

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:18 JST Robin DeRosa

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     His grandmother rescued a pigeon that had a broken wing. She nursed it and kept it out the fire escape on a long string around its foot. When it was time to eat, she would pull the pigeon down from the roof with the string and feed it.

     The pigeon was named Brigit.

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     Robin DeRosa (actualham@social.coop)'s status on Tuesday, 31-Dec-2024 09:25:19 JST Robin DeRosa

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     When he was a teenager, he would take the old metal cores of carburetors from his dad’s mechanic shop and bring them to the junk man to sell the metal. He would get 5 cents a pound. He did this every Saturday and that was what paid the rent on the shop many weeks.