By Karl R. Bossi

The kid growing up on the slick gray cobblestone streets in the Dorchester section of Boston never savored those days until decades later. My determined grandfathers, one a carpenter, the other a bricklayer, came from northern Italy and Switzerland to work alongside other immigrant tradesmen to shape Boston. Their brains and brawn helped make the city of my birth a unique place. Many books and speeches have celebrated the early entrepreneurs, cultured intellectuals, and powerful politicians; their legacies are etched in stone. Yet, the ordinary, blue-collar working people received little praise as they toiled quietly to make a difference. Self-reliance, perseverance, industry, frugality, and good sense ensured success. My quest to save their story told me so.

Sudden death is always hard to accept. When my father killed himself just days before the senior prom, it changed my life. My secret fantasy to erect monoliths of concrete, steel, and brick alongside the entrepreneur ended that day and fate stepped in. A successful builder, Romey rarely displayed his feelings, and nobody recognized the downward spiral of his final days.

For many years, I cried myself to sleep. And when people asked me how he died, I'd say, "A heart attack. Yeah, he was pretty young," my canned response to avoid replaying the shocking footage of his death and answering the probing questions. After Pop died, the only solace for me was my mother's words, "My dear, in every life a little rain must fall." Whenever Pop's name came up, my older brothers changed the subject. But, the reason why Romey died needed an answer. It took me fifty years to confront what had happened.

The last baby in a family of three boys, a de facto only child, I remember the good and the bad times of the olden days. In high school my buddies called me Moose, but my mother wouldn't accept that. On one muggy, Boston summer afternoon, while reading upstairs in the den of his century-old house, I barely heard the front door chimes. Muted voices wafted up the staircase, a door slammed, then all was quiet. Later when we met in the kitchen, she had a peculiar, contented look on her round unblemished face. "Mum, who came to the door?" She spit out the words, "Some scrawny girl with no brains I never met, lookin' for Moose. I told her no animals live here."

It was a different world, a much simpler world; neighbors shared common goals. Yet family life remained intensely personal. It was an era when the proud survivors of the Great Depression shared the same lifeboat, and most pressed forward unselfishly to fight fascism. People learned to accept the sacrifices made in their daily lives; the concept of a "Me" generation would come much later. The glue that held my multinational neighborhood together was civility and respect for others. Most people showed concern about how others viewed them. As Mum used to say, "People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones."

Big, burly Irish cops in their somber dark-blue uniforms patrolled our streets swinging long, black billy clubs. We kids respected them and sensed they cared about us. Children who dared utter "bad" words had to chew on a bar of soap; I can still remember the taste. Far fewer murderers, rapists and robbers prowled the alleys. When a child walked to school alone, rode the bus or took the subway, parents didn't have to worry about pedophiles. Most offenders feared the wrath of this tested social order.

Schools were like an annex of home. Teachers made us toe the line; drug abuse and school shootings didn't happen. Alcohol seemed to be the only drug that affected some neighborhood families. Most men smoked or chewed tobacco, but "decent" women didn't indulge. Newlyweds stayed around after marriage; grandparents lived close by. When we walked home from school for lunch, our mothers were there. Both parents didn't need to work outside the home to make ends meet.

Next door to one another in the bustling, ethnic enclave of "Nawfalk Av" in "Dawchesta" is where my parents grew up. Rows of flat-roofed, shingle-clad, mostly two- and three-decker houses with no front yards hugged the old by-way. After supper, men in white sleeveless undershirts and their wives, wearing cotton frocks, sat on the front stoops to escape the muggy, summer heat. With their kids playing in front, they laughed and greeted friends. Many came from Italy or Switzerland. Now they lived on an island in a sea of mostly Irish descendants, but still felt at ease conversing in their native dialects. Grateful to be Americans, all shared an intense pride in their new country. Almost every day women swept the sidewalks and stoops; their front brass door handles and doorbells gleamed from frequent polishing.

Destiny pulled me into a nomadic military life that included extended duty in foreign countries. The career that swept me away, and that I later embraced, some might call foolhardy and dangerous. Not everyone volunteers for a job in explosive bomb disposal or shepherding stockpiles of nuclear weapons.

When I was born, the ominous shadows of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan threatened global peace. It was a time when the world and later my own life would be turned upside down. Many years afterward, I attempted to bring order to the scattered bits of colored glass inside the kaleidoscope of my life.

•••

Kneeling to brush away a few dead leaves from a worn gravestone half-buried in the wet grass, I barely made out the name Antonio; then my last name appeared. Could this be the grave of my great grandfather?

On that drizzly day in an Old Word cemetery, I noticed several other graves with my family name carved in the native stone. And I wondered if these likely ancestors once had the same blood as mine flowing through their veins. Chalk-white marble monuments dotted the ordered landscape; many of them held photographs of the dead, sealed in glass. These people who once lived in another time stared out at me. It seemed that the pride these paesanos, fellow villagers, felt for their departed ones is the same that Bostonians of many cultures know today.

•••

When I close my eyes to think about Nonno, the only grandfather in my life, a mixture of stale cigar smoke and wine that stalked his clothes comes to mind. A pungent scent that signaled he was near. Those knobby, black Italian cigars he liked to smoke and the mellow, dry, red wine brewed in his cellar and drank every day seemed like best friends, always close-by. Other than a ruddy complexion and a twinkle in his eyes, these vices had little effect on him.

A solitary man, Mum's father, Cesare, came to Boston over two decades after my father's parents arrived and settled nearby with his family. Nonno could be ornery, obstinate, yet he displayed a quirky sense of humor. One night while over for supper, he got to watch television for the first time. A circus act flickered on the tiny black and white screen in the dimly lit parlor; trapeze artists on the high wire flawlessly sailed through the air. How would Nonno react to this marvel of technology? After a few minutes, he stood up to leave then muttered to the room in disgust, "It's all done with mirrors!"

•••

Our bright orange wooden MTA electric-powered "cattle cars" used to lumber along on steel tracks in the streets. The commuters sat on hard wooden benches or stood and clutched onto overhead leather straps. When I slid into a seat before a lady did, Mum dug an elbow into my ribs. "Be a gentleman, get up." Most men felt compelled to give a woman their seat.

As my streetcar lurched down the street, other kids hung on the back until the conductor spotted them. Before they darted away, the kids often yanked the pulley off the overhead line to keep the streetcar from moving. Soon the Kingston Trio made "Charley on the MTA" famous, about subway cars snaking through dank dark tunnels to downtown Boston like those from Andrew Square The lyrics are still close to my heart, "He may ride forever 'neath the streets of Boston. He's the man who never returned."

•••

After my first school burned down, the tired red brick William E. Russell School on Columbia Road, not far from my house, took its place. William Eustis Russell, Governor of the Commonwealth, served around the turn of the century and later officials dedicated the school to him, only a few years before my parents studied there. And like them, my teachers were women and all my classmates were white.

Kids can be cruel to their peers. Sometimes in the playground when tempers flared a kid screamed, "Hey, dago, you ginny, gimee da ball." And I'd yell back, "Shut up you dumb mick!" My parents always disapproved of any display of prejudice. They taught me the "Golden Rule," and when someone confronted me, they expected me to reply, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me." It never worked for me.

•••

Edward Everett Square sat between my house and school, a spot once known as five corners because of the intersection of five major roads. The first Dorchester settlers lived here along with the first schoolhouse. In nearby Richardson Park still stands a tall, weathered, bronze statue of Edward Everett, a statesman and native son of Dorchester. My teachers never spoke much about him. One day brandishing my homemade slingshot to shoot at a pigeon squatting on his head, I thought, Who was this guy?

History remembers Everett for a boring introduction at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to memorialize those who fell in a bloody Civil War battle. Lincoln's memorable address will be celebrated forever. Yet, in spite of Edward Everett's long-winded oratory, he was a distinguished pastor, a graduate of Harvard, later Professor then President of the University. His public career included Governor of Massachusetts, Congressional Senator, and Secretary of State. When will another Dorchester son surpass his legacy?

•••

As graduation approached, my insatiable need for attention backfired. It began as a regular school day until the final bell rang and we kids headed home. With notebook and schoolbooks tucked under my arm, three other classmates tagged along as I walked close to the curb kicking rocks in my way. We talked about school. One kid said, "Why do we have so many stupid rules?" Before anyone answered, our stealthy Vice Principal, Mister McDonnell, drove past. Without thinking, my arm extended and I bared my middle finger. In the car's rear view mirror his empty eyes stared back at me. "You're gonna' get in trouble," one kid said. "Nah, he didn't see me." That night in bed I prayed for God to give Mister McDonnell a touch of amnesia.

But the next morning in the schoolyard before the bell, the tall slender Vice Principal approached the line of kids. "Did any of you see what happened?" Every one of my cohorts said, "No," shrugging their shoulders. Then slowly turning he said, "Follow me!" Alone upstairs in his office he blurted out, "Kahl, I saw you. You gave me the finger. What do you have to say?" "I'm sorry, sir. It won't happen again." As my words trailed off, he removed his suit jacket, loosened his tie, and rolled up his sleeves. My eyes blurred as he opened the closet door and yanked at the brass chain on the bare hanging bulb.

Several bent rattan sticks stood soaking in a cheap glass vase. The Vice Principal selected a stout one and wiped it clean, then stood aside to test it. The swishing sound told me my time had come. "Put out your hand. This'll teach you a lesson." As the stick came down, I held my breath. After three whacks, a slight smirk appeared on his face, then he stopped; my palm stung then throbbed. Squeezing my hand under my arm seemed to help. "Now go downstairs," he said in a voice two octaves lower. In class, after wiping away my tears, I showed the red welts to the others. One exclaimed, "Look, Kahl got the rat hand." To his credit Mister McDonnell never told my parents about my ill-fated attempt to get attention. Use of the rod to correct wayward students rarely occurred at my school; a practice passed down from Puritan times to discipline children. It worked for me.

•••

Our mother loved to bombard us boys with trite sayings like: "You're full of balloon juice," "Beggars can't be choosers," "Runaway laffin!" And should we ask, "Ma, What's for supper? She exclaimed, "Don't call me Ma! You're havin' crabs and ice water." My brother Roger usually countered, "We had that last night." But Mum's final reply, "Merda de piyon," was always the same, It means pigeon sh&emdash;, so we shut up. In general, whenever her boys got out of line, our mother muttered, "Sac de frumento" literally, a bag of wheat, instead of the curse word, Sacramento. It got the message, "leave me alone," across. And whenever I'd sneeze, Mum snapped back, "Creppa bestia!," Die beast! People spoke these words in the Old Country to scare away the devil.

•••

With three boys at the supper table combined with a stressful job, Pop had a low threshold for wisecracks. My sullen oldest brother, Donald, sometimes showed a surly side; Roger usually played it safe. And if I hogged the conversation, Mum called me a chiacchierone," a chatterbox. But should a son step over the line, Pop began moving objects sitting on the shiny oilcloth. A glass of milk, a jar of mustard or pickled pigs feet suddenly took a new place. With his arm extended, a face turned to stone, Pop slowly took practice swings. The back of his hand stopped inches from the offender's face. Rarely did anyone get whacked; this show of force received our full attention.

At mealtimes, when I dawdled over my food, droning on about my day, Mum's patience quickly wore thin. "Mangia! Mangia tas!," "Eat, eat, and keep quiet!" And if I didn't clean my plate, she became more upset. Whenever I tried to hide a crust of bread behind my dish, it never worked. Then I'd have to listen to what Pop's mother had told him. In a nutshell, if any child didn't clean the plate, after they died each little finger would become a lighted candle to see the food they failed to eat. This family legend from the Old Country didn't help my waistline.

•••

After breakfast on Sundays our mother shooed her sons out the door for Catholic mass. Both parents stayed home; we didn't have a choice. Most of my relatives attended church only during weddings and funerals. By now the St Kevin Church occupied the old Telephone Exchange building on Columbia Road. Before entering, everyone touched the font of holy water then made the sign of the cross on their forehead. In those days women covered their heads, either with a scarf or a hat.

The pageantry of the Latin Mass, the aroma of the incense, the soft tinkle of chimes, the beautiful organ music and the evocative sermons made a big impression on me. The memories of sweet smells and soothing bells still linger after all those years. And who could forget the powerful biblical epigraph on the wall next to the altar, I Am The Vine; You Are The Branches. Without Me You Can Do Nothing. Although Bishop Dalton was the Pastor then, everyone from that era remembers Father Joe Kierce. In spite of an ascetic appearance, this lean, bespectacled priest was, in fact, a good-natured extrovert. His long ministry at St Kevin's brought peace and comfort to parishioners of all ages.

During the mass the priest says, Dominus vobiscum, this ancient Latin salutation means, "May the Lord be with you." These words are repeated eight times before the collection baskets are passed. Years later as ushers began to move the wicker baskets up and down the aisles, some of my irreverent friends nudged me and whispered, "Dominec go frisk 'em."

Note to the reader: This piece contains excerpts from a book planned for publication in 2005.

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About the Author

Karl Bossi grew up close to Edward Everett Square where the William E. Russell School shaped his early years. His college foundation was laid at Boston Technical High School, later demolished for the Prudential Center. After Northeastern University, a career in the United States Air Force sent him to Japan, Spain, Turkey, and Vietnam. As a volunteer there in 1969, Karl led an Explosives Ordnance Disposal (EOD) team. After completing military service as a lieutenant colonel, he chose a new profession in military avionics in New Mexico. An award-winning photographer and free-lance photojournalist, published in national and Southwestern magazines, Karl lives in Venice, Florida.