Looking back from the perspective of adulthood, I began to realize the effect my grandmothers had on me.
My grandmothers couldn’t have been more different, and I received an early education in diversity from knowing them. They lived three thousand miles apart, came from different cultures, and spoke different languages.
Immigrants from Italy, my father’s parents both arrived in America through Ellis Island but not together. Grandfather Phillippo Pasquarelli, born near Rome but raised in Naples, was just seventeen years old and alone when he decided to stow away on a ship to America to start a new life in 1903. He was barely alive when he docked in New York Harbor, and since he was without a passport or papers (hence, the term “WOP”), US officials were going to send him back to Italy on the next ship. Fortunately, a nurse working in the hospital on the island intervened. Fearing he wouldn’t survive the voyage back, she took care of him until he was well enough to venture out on his own.
My grandmother, Maria Gallo, his future wife, was sixteen when she came to America ten years later. Maria left Italy to escape a planned marriage. She boarded an Italian vessel to New York Harbor, traveling third class (water level). Her ticket cost sixty dollars, which was paid by her older sister, already living in Riverside, Connecticut.
My grandparents met at a neighborhood christening party not far from where Maria lived. Phillippo was working on the road crew constructing the Boston Post Road (now Route 1 from Boston to New York City), and he was asked to play his button accordion at the event. When he saw Maria, it was love at first sight. They were married seventy years.
Whenever we visited them in Connecticut, my grandmother was in the kitchen and my grandfather in his garden. Family was central to their lives, and everything revolved around the kitchen table. She was an unsophisticated yet wonderful cook, and she wasn’t happy unless she was feeding you—homemade everything, of course. “Mangia, mangia” was an early Italian phrase I learned spending time at their house.
My father was one of their eight children, and except for him and another son who moved out West, all settled relatively close to the family homestead to raise their families. When the Connecticut clan got together (which was at the very least every Sunday for spaghetti), there was frequently music, singing, and dancing, with my grandfather playing his accordion and my grandmother playing along with her tambourine and castanets.
I was raised in California, where my mother was born. Her parents were refined, reserved, and well educated. Their heritage was English, Irish, Swiss, and Pennsylvania Dutch, and they could trace their roots in America back to 1726. Her parents met in high school and later married while attending the University of California, Berkeley. My maternal grandmother, Goldie Shellenberger, had been valedictorian of her high school and graduated from Berkeley in 1910, which is very impressive when you consider the lack of opportunity for women at that time (and for many years after).
My grandfather, Charles Cunningham, was later appointed to the diplomatic service and served as commercial attaché for the embassy of the United States (equivalent today to an ambassador). This gave my grandparents the opportunity to experience the world, living first in the Philippines and later in Spain, Mexico, and Peru. They dined with kings, entertained the highest dignitaries, and were accorded all the honors given to diplomats.
I never knew my grandfather Charles as he died before I was born, but I was close to my maternal grandmother, Goldie, and share much of her sensibility. I decorate my home much like hers, with fine antiques and treasures from around the world. I like to collect, as she did, beautiful teacups, hand-painted plates, sterling silver spoons, and special artifacts representative of diverse cultures. I love to entertain, I love learning, and I love to travel to exotic places, three of her favorite pastimes.
This nana embraced a wide range of interests and relished seeking new experiences. I learned so much from her. She taught me to play bridge and canasta. (I love playing cards!) Oh, and chocolate! Gotta love a grandmother who hides Hershey bars in her lingerie drawer for her granddaughter to find. And there was something else about her I found fascinating—her curious mind. For while she was the wife of a diplomat and held formal parties for as many as eighty-five people at a time, she also had her secret passions for astrology and tarot cards. I was intrigued by her breadth of interests and abilities: some formal and so proper, others more playful and fanciful. It was fun for me to discover her different sides.
When my parents married, it must have been like two different worlds uniting—or colliding, as it turned out. Yet I was the recipient of the best of both of those worlds. From my nana back east, I came to appreciate family and the value of keeping it together. She was a strong woman and demonstrated, through selfless giving, the role of caretaker and problem solver, providing a safe harbor for all under her wing.
From Goldie, my nana in Los Angeles, I learned a sense of propriety and independence along with a fearless can-do attitude. She didn’t need the feminist movement to prove a woman could make her own way. She wrote her own valedictory speech in high school called “The Power of the Individual” in 1905. She was way ahead of her time.
I am a combination of both my grandmothers. I noticed years ago that I am more like my grandmothers than I am either my mother or father, which was a remarkable insight. I wondered if there might be a pattern here, as I have the impression that characteristics tend to skip generations. My husband is much like his grandfather, and my daughter shares much in common with my mother. It will be fun to see if any of my grandchildren take after me.
I realize now, as a grandmother, that in their own distinct ways, my grandmothers empowered me to be the person I am today. They were both strong women and ignited in me my passion for family and love of continuous learning, along with the strong core values of faith, fortitude, loyalty, self-reliance, and always doing my best. I learned from their examples how to overcome obstacles, and they taught me to embrace life with gratitude, which I know is the basis of my happiness. I also learned that it doesn’t hurt to believe in a little magic now and then either.