Saying Good-Bye
I wrote this in honor of my mother at the time of her passing. Original version delivered at St. Joseph's RC Church, Hewlett, NY, on January 7, 2020; expanded version written during the month of January 2020 Growing up, I remember people who spoke of my mother always mentioned her toughness. To my little girl brain this kind of made sense: Tessie was born during the Great Depression into an enormous family of Italian immigrants, # 9 out of 10 children. In the Rockaways. How even as a child, she wouldn’t take any guff or BS from the stupid boys or the mean girls in the neighborhood who picked on her sisters. How time and time again she would come home after another scuffle at school, her hair a tangled mess, her clothes torn, and Grandma Greco would fret, “Oh, no, Teresina, not again!” From birth, Clairie, Tessie and Chickie, #s 8, 9 and 10 in the Greco family line-up, formed an unbreakable bond of sisterhood and friendship that lasted a lifetime. ...