A Primo Story: On Primo Fiore’s 90th Birthday

When I time travel back to the first decade or so of my life, over fifty years ago, my mind’s eye shows me a gallery of scenes. I hesitate to enter and relive those that are of dark times or events shrouded in regret. But some memories shine so beautifully through the haze of years that they irresistibly invite me to enter them – like the warm glow of a kitchen fragrant with the home-sweet-Italian-home aroma of tomato sauce simmering on the stove that urges you closer and closer.

The scene titled, “The Day My Dad Drove Me to Meet the Fiores for the First Time,” is one such irresistible memory.

Traveling back to that time . . .

My Dad picks me up from Bay Ridge in Brooklyn, where I live with my Mom and her family. Today, he’s driving me to his sister’s house in Deer Park out on Long Island. It’s a pleasant ride on a sunny day from the familiar Belt Parkway to what looks to my Brooklyn-born eyes to be a forest road that is the Southern State Parkway.

I ask my Dad, “Who do I know that’s going to be there?” He tells me that my Aunt Sue and my Uncle Primo will be there with their children who are my cousins. I latch onto the familiar word.

“Which cousins? Phyllis? Rachel? Jerome?”

“No, cousins you’ve never met. There’ll be Mario, and another Louis, Elly, Laura, Rachel, and Christa.”

“That many?”

“Don’t worry, Louis, you’ll have a great time there.”

I ask, “Are they nice?”

“Of course they’re nice, you banana. They’re family.” He glances at me and says, “Louis, relax. Everyone there is super!”

I nod and bite my nails thinking “everyone” is nice to my Dad. People enjoy his company. He likes to talk to them and they love to listen. My Dad brightens a room like a generator, not of electric current but of smiles and laughter. So, my Dad has lots of friends. I don’t. He’s not shy and fat like I am.

I sit quietly for the rest of the ride thinking about meeting a bunch of strangers in a strange land, listening to my Dad singing along with the radio. He loves to sing when he drives. As usual, the radio is tuned to WMCA. Prompted by the deejay’s announcement, he says, “This is ‘The Good Guys’ radio station. Hey Louis, you know what? We’re the good guys too!” I accept these words as gospel truth because just like anyone else who knows my father, I know – with absolute certainty – Sal Balbi is a good guy. He’s got to be a good guy to be so accepting and non-judgmental of people, including his odd-duck, bookish, introverted son.

My Dad drives with the joy and grace of someone in their element. He alternately sings, whistles, or hums. I’m amazed and envious of how comfortable and at ease he is in his own skin. On the other hand, on the other side of the front seat, my nervous stomach’s a little queasy as the brown and green of the trees blur by. Even though my stomach frets and fusses, my rational mind knows everything will be pretty much okay because I’m not just with my Dad, I’m with Sal Balbi and that means something. He is someone special.

Whenever I’d meet anyone I didn’t know at a large family-and-friends get together and say, “Hi, I’m Lou, I’m Sal Balbi’s son,” it’s like I showed them the Golden Ticket. I could see it in their eyes. In an uncertain childhood, that was something I could count on. And so, like always, being with Sal Balbi that day is a privilege. But one troubling thought keeps popping into my anxious mind: “Dear God, please don’t let me throw up when we get there.”

Either the reception for the prayer request line is especially good this particular day or the Almighty just doesn’t care to see my half-digested breakfast deface the front lawn or stoop of 34 Byway Drive.

Crossing the threshold of the Fiore home, I “stay close” to my Dad – possibly “cling” would be more accurate. I hear the raucous sounds of kids playing somewhere out in the backyard. An image comes to mind of Peter Pan’s wild-eyed, lost boys playing unsupervised in the woods, running with sharp objects. Well, at least that group of strangers won’t have to be faced until later.

My Dad announces, “Sue, we’re here!”

We walk into the kitchen and my father hugs Aunt Sue. She smiles at me and bends to hug me. I feel safe in her embrace. At least, safer. Whatever words she says can’t be heard over the distance of decades. But the warmth of her voice, the kindness in her eyes, and the gentleness of her touch are not, and never will be, forgotten.

And then the small kitchen gets smaller and louder. “So who do we have here?” booms a powerful voice behind us sounding like the voice of God.

Every single one of the out-of-shape muscles in my body immediately tenses, transforming me into a statue, titled, “The Boy Who Desperately Wants to Go Back Home to Brooklyn.”

My Dad turns and says, “Primo!” with obvious joy. They face each other and share a grin that even my inexperienced eyes can tell means that these two have a history of good-natured fun together.

My Aunt Sue slowly and softly says, “Primo…” Her eyes gently chastising, as she senses my fear.

Uncle Primo fluidly switches gears, “You must be Louis. I feel like I know you because your father is always talking about you.” Then he gives me that good-as-gold Primo smile, which begins to put me at ease.

Then Uncle Primo says, “The other children are outside. Why don’t you go say hi?”

I ask my Dad, “By myself? All alone?”

He sighs and says, “I’ll take you out to meet them in a minute. Come and sit down with us in the dining room.”

Under Aunt Sue’s watchful gaze, Uncle Primo and my Dad tell each other jokes. I don’t get some of them, usually the ones that make Aunt Sue smile but shake her head. After a bit, one of them says, “Hey, I told you that one.” And then the other says, “But I tell it better than you.” Their laughter and genuine affection for each other make me feel more comfortable.

The next scene is out in the back with my new cousins and a three-legged frog. Then they invite me into an honest-to-God wooden ship listing at almost a forty-five-degree angle on their backyard’s green sea of grass. Its dilapidated condition precludes it from being fitted with billowing sails or flying a pirate flag. My eyes wonder in amazement at this place’s interesting curiosities, which include an Italian bowling alley on the side of the house that they tell me is called a bocce court. And so I idly wonder if there is any pirate treasure buried somewhere here as well.

After future – more-at-ease visits – I discovered that while there wasn’t any pirate chest stuffed with gold and silver, there was indeed the most wonderful kind of treasure at the Fiore home. Words, even at their very best, would only be able to struggle valiantly, but futilely, to do justice attempting to name that sacred treasure. And so, I hope that you have been blessed by grace, or favored by fortune, to know it – or, at the very least, been in its presence as I have been.

***

So was that my “Primo Story”?

Nope. That part of the past is prologue. Apparently, just like a streaming video service, the mind connects episodes in our memory in order to set up and serve the next one.

At another visit, long after many visits to the Fiores had made me finally feel like family and truly comfortable there . . .

I am sitting in the dining room with my Dad along with my Uncle Primo, who is telling me stories. Not made-up ones, which are fun, but real stories from his life. I always love listening to these types of stories. People older than me are like frontier scouts who have traveled further into unknown territory than I have. On this day, Uncle Primo shared a child-friendly version of traveling all over the world when he was serving in the military.

My Dad couldn’t serve because of a childhood injury. And I knew about Uncle Joey Balbi who died in the Korean War. But I had never heard from someone who joined the military and came home. And so I listened attentively to my Uncle Primo’s every word.

At some point during his storytelling, he seemed to remember something and stood up. He said, “Come with me, Louis. I want to show you something from when I served.”

As we went upstairs, my heart grew excited as I wondered if he was going to show me his service rifle, his pistol, or maybe a medal – you know all the shiny stuff young boys foolishly believe makes being in the military cool.

From the top drawer in his bureau, Uncle Primo took out a small object covered in a cloth that he revealed with classic Primo-Pomp-and-Circumstance. His voice was so full of gravitas that it would have given Morgan Freeman a run for his money.

His hands slowly unveiled a cylindrical, wooden object with oriental (as we would have called it back then) decoration. He told about acquiring it in Japan, saying that it once belonged to a Japanese soldier. I listened, entranced.

Then with a slow, dramatic flourish, he ceremoniously pulled it apart to reveal a miniature samurai sword (actually more of a letter opener – but to my boy’s eyes it was a small sword fit for a warrior).

Uncle Primo impressed upon me two things – that it was of great age and it was important to him. It deserved to be treated respectfully and not like a toy or even like a common pocket knife.

He asked me if I understood. I nodded. Then he handed it to me, sheathed. I withdrew the blade and looked at it admiringly. I looked at the crack in the wooden sheathe – proof to my mind of its aged venue. When I went to hand it back, I heard a deep voice pronounce, “It’s yours, Louis – if you can treat it with respect and honor.”

“I will,” I stammered. Then breathlessly, “Are you sure?”

He looked me in the eyes and solemnly said, “I want you to have it. I trust you will cherish it as I have.”

When Uncle Primo and I returned to the dining room table, I showed it to my Dad and excitedly told him all about it. He smiled but looked quizzically at Primo. I could tell there was some grown-up subtext that I wasn’t understanding but I didn’t care. I was happy. I was grateful. I felt special. And I had a miniature samurai sword!

***

So why have I chosen to tell this particular Primo Story from a half-century ago to celebrate the man’s ninetieth birthday?

Well, it’s not about the letter opener replica of a samurai sword. Or about Primo, Master of Stories. It’s about Primo, the Big-Hearted. Primo, the Generous. Primo, the Kind.

I mean, what the hell possessed the man to give me what I now assume to be a souvenir picked up when he was serving overseas and long relegated to a corner of a bureau drawer. And what made him frame the gift-giving inside a tale certain to impress a young boy, thereby investing it with so much meaning?

I am not saying that miniature katana-cum-letter-opener is my favorite gift of all time. After all, how could it be? I mean, every gift is special when given and received with love. Nevertheless, that little samurai sword certainly stands out as one of the most memorable and important.

Why? Because it was not merely an object that my Uncle Primo gave me that day over fifty years ago. Its importance in my memory isn’t due merely to the tall tale that it was gift-wrapped in.

I do not know whether he intended it at the time but while the details of his dramatic presentation may not have been technically factual, at its core was something true and precious conjured by his authentic heart and soul. His gift that day was not a miniature samurai sword or a souvenir letter opener in a cracked, paint-chipped, wooden sheathe.

That day for no apparent reason, Primo Fiore presented me with his gift of a respected adult’s belief in me, his trust in my character, his faith in my honor, and his respect for my worth. And that day, this memory, will be with me until I die – and beyond – because it made such a significant difference to the awkward foal of a boy that I was all those years ago.

With Love, Respect, and Best Wishes,

 Lou Balbi

[Sal Balbi’s son. Sue and Primo Fiore’s nephew.]