La Passione

LA PASSIONE

There are those who grow vegetables and there are those who do not. Henry, Dad’s neighbor, had never in his life plunged his hand into warm and rich soil. One sultry summer afternoon, with the eagerness of a neophyte, Henry approached Dad for advice.
“So Med, I‘ve been watching you in your garden all these years that we’ve been neighbors. You really have a green thumb. I’d like to do what you do, grow food that I can pick and eat fresh from the earth. I have every imaginable gadget and tool but don’t have any idea where to begin.” Henry, a butcher by trade, was always a little nervous talking to Dad.
Patiently, with a half smile on his face, Dad queried, “Henry, do you have any idea how much work is involved? This ain’t like slicin’ meat, ya’ know. You’re gonna get dirt under your nails and sweat like hell. Your back will ache and hands will bleed. This ain’t for sissies, ya’ know.” Dad came from another time than the one he was planting in. He was wiry and a little grizzled, the weather-beaten heir of an older peasant generation.
Henry mulled it over. Dad’s words had cast some doubt over his resolve but the possibility of garden bounty from his own hands was too tempting to ignore.
Speaking with disarming straightforwardness, Henry replied, “I know, Med, that I have a lot to learn. And I think that I can learn what I need from you. You’re a master gardener, feeding the neighborhood every summer, leaving bags of vegetables at backdoors up and down the street. I’d be grateful to you if you’d teach me how to garden.” Henry clutched his hat in his hand, his body slightly bent in Dad’s direction like a humble beggar.
Dad pulled his cap down over his eyes. Henry waited. Finally, with a simple nod, Dad initiated a new relationship with Henry. The two men shook hands and Dad announced with extraordinary charm, “OK, Henry, let’s talk about this over lunch. ” Henry beamed and followed Dad in a delirium of excitement.
They crossed Henry’s yard, skirted the picnic table, and maneuvered their way down the bank and past the shed. At the far end of the garden was a cool patch of grass under the spreading arms of a chestnut tree. An oval pool elevated on a column of cement stood near the upturned wooden crates that had traveled from Italy bearing last fall’s harvest of grapes. Dad gestured to Henry to take a seat and produced the inevitable wine bottle and two glass jelly jars. Tucked inside a nearby freeform rock sculpture was Dad’s lunch. He laid it out on a cement table to share with Henry: a chunk of pungent aged parmesiano-reggiano, a crusty loaf of Italian bread, and a slab of sopresatta.
“Henry, I think we should start with tomatoes.” With a broad complicitous smile, he leaned forward and said, “It’s all about la passione. Without la passione, without desire, they will not grow. If things don’t go well at first, you must be willing to go on until they do. Never give up! Don’t settle for a good tomato, only the best is good enough.”
Henry nodded, a bit overawed at the seriousness of Dad’s devotion to this pulpy berry in the nightshade family. The intensity and fervor of Dad’s spirited words startled him a bit; such ardent feelings coming from a man with muscled forearms, a penchant for
GIARNESE

heavy machinery and activities rarely requiring fine motor coordination. Henry was far from being a kindred soul to Dad but was instantly converted as Dad’s enthusiasm washed over him.
As the conversation ended, so the adventure of chance and change began. Stepping into the garden, Dad explained to Henry that tomato growing requires a balanced mix of caress and coercion. With the mounds of manure steaming in piles behind him, Dad counseled Henry in the ways of organic gardening: spacing and staking; watering and feeding; pest control, companion planting, aerating soil and pinching suckers.
And then the fatal piece of information: experimentation! Being a bit squeamish and not altogether trusting of Dad’s inventive ways, Henry asked just what he meant. Dad reached behind the logs of the raised bed and brought out a vial of amber particles. In the overpowering heat of day, Dad dramatically described to Henry the mixture of chemicals he had concocted and intended to use on the plants to grow tomatoes of extraordinary size and flavor.
Henry, poker-faced, baffled and breathing hard, asked, “So Med, what’s in the mix?”
Dad, secretive as inventors are want to be, tossed Henry glib vague assurance, saying, “It’s all natural stuff, Henry. What are you worried about? Where is la passione? Put out your hands.” With some reluctance Henry obeyed seeing the look on Dad’s face. The two knelt side by side in the sacred dust, at the base of each tomato plant. Henry, following Dad’s lead, scattered the granules in a circle around each plant. They refilled their palms from the vial, sprinkling the mystical potion in tandem. Perspiring in the midday sun, wiping the sweat from their brows as it trickled salty and stinging into their eyes, Henry and Dad were bent on their task, consumed with the vision of glorious abundant fruit.
At last, the day’s lesson ended and garden chores were done. Dad and Henry ambled up toward the house in the fading light. Before parting they stopped to shake hands, to congratulate each other on a job well done. But the la passione had a dark side, ill conceived and unfortunate: with each wipe of the brow, the combination of chemicals and sweat had handily removed a protective layer of outer skin. Henry was incredulous and shuddered at the sight of lank lines the color of raw meat that lingered on Dad’s forehead. Dad returned his gaze, glimpsed Henry’s dissolving face and shot him a look of silent sympathy. Both men were shocked to see the raw redness that began just below the hairline. The entire area above the eyes and nose was framed by flaking peeling scraps of skin and patches of angry blazing scarlet marks.
“What happened?” Henry wailed. “How am I going to explain this to Beaulah?” He glanced anxiously ahead, wondering how he might avoid his sharp-tongued wife.
Dad gave Henry a sardonic smile. He had been in many a fix before and expected that his wife would merely survey the damage with weary indifference.
“La passione, Henry. Either you have it or you don’t!”

Story ID:	847
Written by:	toni giarnese (bio, contact, other stories)
Story type:	Family History
Location:	new hartford USA
Year:	2006