***like, WHAT part of my story…I include, I don’t know…
Hours, these people could speak for hours, with no complex about “needing to separate,” be in their own “neat space,” this is mine, this is yours— this idea — Franco was concerned — that I— didn’t want this attention. My story brought it to me. Didn’t want it to consume Christmas. Franco didn’t appreciate that attitude. I laughed. WHO, si, Flora, WHO, si si, WHO is encouraging you to NOT SPEAK! Franco COULD SEE someone ELSE through my FIGURE.
“WHO IS THIS PERSON?”
“You’re BECOMING someone else.”
Franco saw it. He will gladly tell you.
I couldn’t stop laughing.
Franco could see when I was becoming someone else. This isn’t you.
“You’re hanging out with your professor? Maria…” he trailed off. “Not like that…” Franco didn’t understand why. I laughed. He found that to be weird. Sometimes, when I began to talk, I could feel Franco skating off inside of his own head…preparing himself for the train wreck of words coming at him. “He’s like my family…” I used that phrase, sometimes, and they would collectively pause. Okay…and in my case, I gotta admit, you know that phrase “you choose your family?” Franco got hazy with a smile, what is this phrase? Flora turned, frowned. I was laughing.
“You cannot change your family… who THIS IS…”
Franco was mildly proud of me now.
“But you…” I trailed off. “Do you…FEEL the SENTIMENT?”
Yeah, they could.
I looked off, sentimental, “you can choose your family…”
“No,” I demanded that they listen, and they did, Neapolitan, now, I got their attention, If I say please, act polite, I’m opening myself up for attack, so LISTEN UP. Si, no change in temperature, very good, Franco Franzese believed I was acting more like my old self.
“I cannot change my family…so I can choose my family…”
They didn’t get it.
“FRIENDS? But these are friends Maria…”
“Si si, but in AMERICA, the people say this…like your family…isn’t very nice, so your friends become your family.”
“So what happens to your family?”
“This is what I mean about America…”
“Dante, si.”
I laughed.
“You choose your family.”
“You mean your wife, husband?”
“I do not know if the people see their families like you…always…”
“No,” I started writing on my palm, “the journalist writes articles on the holidays with titles such as this: how to survive your family…” durante the holidays…
“What’s hard about spending holidays with your family?”
Nodding, these people came to a different world.
“I suppose family gets on one’s nerves from time to time, but don’t you want to spend time with your family?”
“Not so sure, you see, as a Dante…”
“Si si,” there I was supported 100%.
Not from my eyes, growing wide, “I see this. The American inferno.”
“Si, si,” they said, it was clear to them.
In my case, “I had to get out, no?” Making a swimming arm, landing on the door, which they didn’t see.
“Of course,” I had nothing but sympathy there, so I could choose consciously, otherwise.
“Keep speaking, keep speaking,” Franco demanded.
People placed me in a position of self-doubt! Trying to be open, not really understanding why he insisted, but I didn’t want to refuse them, with a dip. No sense there.
I had a gestural style, “one of quality” according to them, out of nowhere, Flora moving with greens, very seriously telling me it was “abstract art, a po’ fantastical, si, of quality…”
“Si si,” they didn’t get why I was touched, surprised.
They took me in as if I were there, which made them pause, encouraging, naturally, what they picked up on as my gifts and qualities that they appreciated. Which was lovely. And “grazie,” this word, could drive Franco NUTS as if I were an ALIEN species! I was always like this, as a kid. Franco liked kids. “Vivace,” I switched feet, sent the ball in that direction now, just to find FRANCO HONKING BACK. KEEP talking. So I could get a little fanciful on my feet. Mostly to crack up Franco. To stop HIS INSISTENCE THAT I SPEAK!
No, this professor almost encouraged me not to talk about my feelings… blinking. This person ended up confusing me a lot, he didn’t get this looking around, pointing at things, acting like this. FRANCO was, you see, the OPPOSITE, SPEAK! SHE MUST SPEAK! Some button was pushed in him as a doctor! I couldn’t not speak enough to this man. I couldn’t help but laugh. I just loved Naples. It was so athletic: a speaking MATCH. I lived on an edge, as I said, a Hoover dam, pressure holding back, but spilling out. To them, it looked like chaos, which wasn’t an issue, Neapolitans were totally at ease with someone in a state of chaos. FRANCO wanted it to be released.
YOU SEE?
That’s a scene that I like, but it’s not about, I don’t know, all these families, you know? It sort of is, it was just amazing how FRANCO was able to identify this person channeling through me. With Flora’s hilarious “si si.” She could tell too. Then, we had to talk about that. So, you became very close to your professor, basically, you see? I never had a place to go…ah, so, he just was a kinda a famous teacher, or something, that had an impact on people, okay, who cares? But they didn’t get the performance, all the time, nor did they agree with the effect that it had on me. Like that — really. It wasn’t a healthy relationship. Okay. so we solved that one, Franco waddling away, sort of breathless. Complicate. Complicate.
I’m telling you, this person. Is a strict no. All due respect. This is VICO. These people. That was that. Okay? No, no, no, he wasn’t interested in the “in-between.” Over. Don’t get involved. No no no.
Angela laughing. MERI!
Becoming someone else.
Rosa scrunching her nose.
“Smarix,” Emma. So SMARIX.
It was? Becoming someone else.
I couldn’t get over them.
I came from a weird story, I needed support, not to say there’s anything wrong with this person, you know, relationships are what they are, but I wouldn’t do it again, I would have keep boundaries, but that took me some time. We both didn’t really have family, but today, HALF the shit he said would never fly. I wouldn’t want to hang out like that. In terms of my behavior, I had no clue that I was uncomfortable. Does that make sense? That person doesn’t exist anymore. Which is, apparently, the person that he loves though he told EVERYBODY that I drove him crazy, so why? Pinching my fingers as VICO, why? Would I go towards that EVER again? I ain’t playing no role. He drove ME crazy. But sure, there was a relationship there, I’m just not interested in that dynamic. Choice. I’m literally a different person. No offense. I had a whole thing to work out. lol. Angela.
Anyway, I’m going back…
AND AND AND? You see the Neapolitans? AND? I cannot express MY FEELINGS? TO YOU? Fight back. This is my Neapolitan family. Exactly. SO what? People disagree. There’s the good and the annoying, etc. Laughing. But me taking on so much, like don’t. EXPEL. Totally different world. I might be sensitive, right, which is what people have told me. I had to do a lot of separating. And now, I’m okay. No.
It’s just great, no? The Neapolitans saying NO, erupting, Emma saying “si.” Rosa.