Fish'n With the Stars
Posted: Tuesday, May 04, 2010
by Bing Limousin
DreamHill Farms
It had been a long journey for the thirteen year old immigrant arriving in this country to become a contented old man fishing off the Crane Creek Bridge- still a dreamer.
There aren't many important happenings in his life span that might attract anyone to write about it, except me. I had promised to write this story and take whatever hits' may come.
He would sit there for hours, then pack up his thermos and fishing things to walk back home where my Grandma would be waiting dinner-never expecting to include any fresh fish.
I heard this story from a man I know, his grandson. He is now retired living down the gravel road from me. This man's journey began with his grandfather's journey about a hundred years ago. It is an American story, at least from an old perspective. Today, we all know everyone's view is different; no one would pretend to deny that it isn't.
I'd rather not tell you his real name, I will call my friend Mr. Z and his father's father, Grandpa Z. Mr. Z is a friendly, though private, man preferring to enjoy the quiet solitude of his cabin in the woods together with his wife of almost fifty years. He has earned a simple life without regrets; just like his grandfather.
He understood life was supposed to be hard, never to complain about those many resisting forces along the way- it's just the deal when you think life is like being a small fish swimming against the big currents.
I knew I would write this story someday. I also know many folks will choose not to read it. I'm not saying that in defiance to anyone's beliefs. It just know it won't take long for this topic to hit a hot-button' which scurries folks to opposite corners of the dance floor. That was not my intention -only to tell a story, his story:
"The ships landing in New York Harbor are full of rats," New Yorkers would say in the early 20 th century. They weren't talking about rodents. Grandpa Z was one of those rats from Italy whose dreams were bigger than the Manhattan skyline and whose skin would become as thick as the dense rock that formed the famous City of Hope'.
No one in the family could ever figure how Grandpa Z, at the age of thirteen, was able to travel alone from a small Sicilian village to New York City and survive. We only knew that his father was cruel and he had decided to run awayto America, a place to find freedom-his personal idea of freedom, no one else's.
Five years later young Grandpa Z, working in a hardware-type store, had saved up enough money to send for an older sister to join him in the land of opportunity; there was no hope in the old country. Now both had escaped an abusive home and the tyranny of corrupt, Sicilian politics. After about the same amount of time later he had saved and sent for his younger sister. Now they were all three Americans, not Italian-Americans but Americans. They thought of themselves as being reborn, renewed, transformed.
Everything was against Grandpa Z and yet he survived. He eventually found a salaried job at a large book publisher developing printer plates in vats of acid. Everything he did demonstrated him to be a good, hard and reliable worker. His wife once told a story that he had kept from her for years-it was about prejudice. They didn't call it that in those days, it was just the way things were; you didn't let it bother you. If you did, then you weren't free, and freedom is what you had escaped to.
The story was about his boss telling him that he wanted him to supervise those in his department. But, because he was Italian he couldn't make him an official supervisor. Grandpa Z thought about it and decline because, as he said, "he liked the guys he worked with and if he was their boss they wouldn't like him anymore." His boss got angry and told him that if he didn't accept the added responsibility he would be fired; this was in 1932 and he had a family. So, he acquiesced. He didn't complain and worked there the rest of his career, long enough to earn him a pension when it came time to retire. The idea that life wasn't fair was something he knew about, it was just part of walking in the rain with extra mud on your boots. To complain would mean that he was hopelessly shackled to institutions he had no control over but who had control over him. He believed when people own you, they own your freedom.
Grandpa Z raised a son who never went to college. That son used to get beat up regularly when he strayed to the wrong parts of the city. Grandpa Z went through the same beatings and tried to warn him, but the son had to learn about the ways of the world himself. The city was a dangerous place for Italians, or any immigrant groups. Local folks didn't like their neighborhoods changing with people different from them. Grandpa Z wanted to move his family out of the city.
He only had saved enough money to buy the land, not a house. So he built a house himself. He worked days at the printers then took a train out to his land and worked on the house at night by lantern. The only story I heard about this was that he dug the cellar by himself with a shovel and a wheelbarrow on a pulley to lift the dirt out and dump it. The house's exterior was mostly rock that was freely scattered on the land which he gathered in the same wheelbarrow.
His only son wanted to be an electrical engineer, his passion, but he was Italian and could never get accepted into any local engineering institutes, even though he had worked for years to save the money. "Italians make good tradesman," he was told; like carpenters, plasterers and layers of tile, you know, skills from the old country'. The joke of the day was, "if I need a fresco, I'll give you a call."
He was lucky and got a job in an aircraft factory as an errand boy. The son was a hard a worker, like Grandpa Z, and clever enough to get assigned to the electrical engineering department. He became an assistant-helping the college trained engineers detail out their schematics of control panels in fighter plans for World War II. During the war there were plenty of opportunities to offer ideas and innovations. He could not get credit for his ideas, only the college degreed engineers were allowed to collect idea bonuses'. Sometimes the engineers would give him some extra cash in thanks for his ideas. After the war he was laid off, he move to the southern part of the country where he opened his own successful business and raised his family; four children, all of them graduated from college. They weren't rich but the all worked to get through college.
Mr. Z, the youngest boy, who now lives near me, decided to become a professional in a field he had a passion for but, the odds were greatly against him.
He went to college but not one that would help him get the right skills he needed. Yet, he found a way to learn what he needed on his own to become a player in his field. He went to the big city to make his fame and fortune.
He discovered many things were against him: he was smart and talented but not as smart and talented as most everyone else he worked with, so he worked harder, longer and learned more. He also learned that to be good was not good enough, something his grandpa could have told him. There was a culture of accessibility in which this profession operated. He lacked the proper credentials which he could never attain-he went to college but not to the right prestigious school, he was religious but not the right religion, and he was from a small southern town while others were from the large northeastern and west coast metropolitan areas- he had a twang. It was a time when promotions were based on quotas, he was not in the right mix. But, he was patient and he slowly progressed with new challenges and more responsibilities.
Sometimes he felt he was allowed to the party but not allowed to dance. But, he loved living his dream, the prejudice and politics were just stones in the road, natural obstacles- he had journeyed on a path that everyone said would be impossible for him to travel. He knew that the ignorance of a dreamer is blind to prejudice.
He knew something never spoken but always implied by these three generations of his immigrant family: You will be defined either by others or, defined by yourself. If at least you had freedom with yourself, then you are truly free.
The sunsets of today, for my neighbor, are very much like those of his Grandpa Z long ago. Grandpa Z would sit on that Crane Creek Bridge for hours with his fishing line in the dark, still water watching the sun descend through the trees. Everyone knew that there were no fish to be caught from that bridge. It was just a place for Grandpa Z to go; to reflect upon his dream, now fulfilled. He had escaped tyranny, won against the odds and he was free, still fishing for the stars. He had only himself and his God to thank.
It was a soliloquy that three generations could recite. Mr. Z now sits tonight on his front porch reflecting in a similar manner. He is probably the last of his generations to do so; the kind of simple satisfaction that only an individual's success in the midst of overwhelming obstacles can bring. It is a kind of freedom, a freedom that some can realize and some cannot, and everyone has their reasons why.
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Top-level comments on this article: (7 total)thanks shari-greatly appreciated!Please log in to respond to this comment.
A bittersweet tale, Bing, with a rewarding ending. What courage that young Italian boy had - and passed on.I grapple in my own life with a lot of your stories' themes which for me reflect the value of the individual's journey towards inner freedom.Thanks for this.JenniferPlease log in to respond to this comment.jennifer,as always thanks for your thoughts. remember that note i sent the other day... i thought about that whne i was writing this. these themes are all universal. all of us folks have more in common with each others than those who pull the strings (all sides) want us to discover.thanks,bingPlease log in to respond to this comment.
Love your folksy look at life - keep writing and I will keep reading!Please log in to respond to this comment.
marijo-if i hear a word of encouragement from you, i must be drive'n down the right, bumpy road.hey, i think i heard your woodpecker this morn.bingPlease log in to respond to this comment.
Wonderful...wait a sec while I grab a kleenex. I love the line, 'He knew that the ignorance of a dreamer is blind to prejudice.' and ' Everyone knew that there were no fish to be caught from that bridge. It was just a place for Grandpa Z to go; to reflect upon his dream, now fulfilled.' I can picture him fishing from the bridge and it's a beautiful sight, just like this was a beautiful story. Thanks Bing.Please log in to respond to this comment.brianna,thanks for the kind words.i miss the 'Art of Individualism' these days.of the many things i enjoy living in the country is that folks, like animals, are each different; that's what makes them so interesting. i mean, some think that we should all be stirred together and become 'one'-but if you ask them is their dog or cat the same as the next, they would think you're crazy-go figure!forget the hanky, let's have a beer!bingPlease log in to respond to this comment.
I love the message, don't blame other people, just keep going. That's very American. Thanks.Please log in to respond to this comment.al, thanks for the note...and thanks for 'get'n it'bingPlease log in to respond to this comment.
Very well written. I can see that this is very close to your heart and I can imagine it feel good to tell the story.Please log in to respond to this comment.anonymous, thanks for your kind words...wherever you are?bing (i think?)Please log in to respond to this comment.
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