An All-American Marriage

An All-American Marriage

A Fourth of July Mediation

7/4/2011

On July 4, 1961, Ettore Anselmo Januzzi married Vincenza Jean Giuliani. They were both children of Italian immigrants, one set of parents from Abruzzi, “near Pescara,” Jean would say, the other set from Calabria, “you know the Calabrese,” Ettore used to taut.

They were married on that day because the shoe store that Ettore’s family ran would be closed that particular federal holiday. Ettore’s brother would be married on a New Year’s Day, another holiday that the store was closed.

Their marriage would come to represent the best America had to offer. The union of two immigrant families, whose migration saved them from the impoverished Italy. The families were entreprenuers who created their own opportunities in the shoe repair and bakery business.

When Jean was born, her mother's friends insisted the baby needed an American name, thus Vincenza became Jean. As children, Ettore and Jean were encouraged to speak the English language, out of respect for their new country. They lost their mother tongue, and only occasionally, as when Jean was conversing with a cab driver in Italy, could either of them slip back into that place of prior ease.

Prior to marriage, Ettore had served during the Korean War. Jean had been a school teacher, then a religion teacher. Then, she was free to choose to stay home with her children. Anyone who knew Jean recognized she would have had a stellar career, but being at home was her desire, and her children and their friends would benefit from her famed ravioli and meatballs, her nutroll and the home she created with care.

They were free to choose the number of children they wanted to birth. No Chinese government stepped in to tell them they had too many daughters (four, gasp!). No Catholic authority figuring telling them to have more (gasp again).

Ettore and Jean choose public school education for their children because that too was the foundation of America. They trusted the government and the good people of the town where they lived would funnel their talents and energy into high achieving schools, that level which is still achieved today.

When it came time to move the family to larger home, Ettore paid cash for the home he would reside in for thirty-five years. None of their children ever wore Jordache jeans, and even though the kids were a from a shoe store family, they often went barefoot anyhow.

Through fifty years, they had access to health care, through which they sought out the treatment of breast cancer, kidney cancer, heart disease, arthritis, appendectomy and now, sadly, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.

Jean sang in the choir, at church funerals, baked the Eucharistic bread and gave out communion. Together, they worked church fish frys and the county polls every Election Day for twenty years. Ettore would still be working his shift today, if he didn’t feel bad about Jean not being able to do so. With her dementia, she just might throw the election the wrong way. And Ettore still holds a position on the county housing authority, using his time to assist those in need. He may, at this stage, have become a figurehead, but his presence and perseverance is a model to others.

They gardened and canned, and froze and sauced every vegetable and fruit they could get their hands own. They had no expectations other than the one that has recently been tossed out of our society, and that is to work hard. While their lives revolved around their children, with five, it would be difficult for it to be otherwise, the children were never indulged or led to believe that they were deserving of all their blood, sweat and tears, only some.

Though Ettore and Jean, in their hearts and blood, were Italian-Americans, they never insisted upon the hyphenation. They knew who they were.

The weekend of their latest wedding anniversary, they attended a baseball game, were given a rousing Happy Anniversary by a tenor Ettore happened to have worked with a while ago, and later, in church, were called “heroes” by the deacon in his sermon. To which they humbly dropped down their heads in tears and gratitude.

On July 4, 2011, on a starlit cool summer evening within view of the shores of Lake Erie, only blocks from the families’ original bakery and shoe store, surrounded by children, grandchildren and fireworks set to no music at all, Ettore and Jean Januzzi celebrated fifty years of marriage, an American marriage.

Selling Ourselves

Look busy Father and Uncle would crow
to employees
toiling in the shadows
of 26^th and Broadway
beneath the banner of Januzzi’s Shoes.

Together they paced the aisles
before Father returned
to the back office space
to pore over “the books.”

We would be dispatched to our stations -
Brother to the store room to unpack
the cartons delivered by the man in brown.
It would have been like Christmas,
if Brother had been me,
caressing each style
before pricing and stocking.

Sister would slowly wind her way
towards the counter
to stand stoic
beside the rigid cash register queen
who scolded her when wrinkled ones and fives
were turned opposite of tens and twenties.

Grandpa, founder and mender,
would retire to his repair stand
where the musk of newly-shaped leather
mingled with the scent of cobbler’s glue.

Customer names were recorded on cards
kept in a metal cabinet.
Filing the recently pulled or
pulling the filed always fell to me.
I would make it a game
see how fast I could order the stack
or search for the cards
of boys with whom I was madly in love,
later to be stung by their betrayal
of wearing of new loafers
bought elsewhere.

Tension lingered in the air
on the days of sales
causing the aisles of shoes to quake -
the children’s section leaning into men’s boots,
rows of nursing whites
holding back women’s heels,
and ice skates teetering on the top
shelves above my head.

Retail was never easy
even before big box stores
swallowed up ideas and families.

But the business had been blessed
by the presence of the mill, the hospital,
and those who needed orthopedic shoes.
As if the store was a ministry itself -
serving and fitting -
and that purpose fed the family,
not the money collected
and carefully counted at day’s end.

Yet customers were never completely content
with the price, style or fit.
Ladies prattled
and squirmed in green vinyl chairs
squeezing bones into shoes too small,
waiting for us to admire their toes
in the slanted mirrors.
We could never lie to them,
we could never tell the truth.

We only knew that the odor of unwashed feet
would cause us
to seek out Grandpa’s shoe glue
or steal away to the store room,
relieved for a moment
from the duty and pride
of selling the shoes, the business, our selves.