This is my father’s first letter to his friends 3 weeks after his mother died. He, his brother Phil and his mother Maria, had finally reached the US in May 1947, to be reunited with my grandfather. They were supposed to have gone many years before, but World War II put a damper on their plans. My grandmother became pregnant with her third son shortly after arriving, and unfortunately, something went terribly wrong, and she died just a couple of days after giving birth to my uncle Frank. My father often told us about what happened and how hard it was, while never letting his emotions show. But this letter…oh my!😥
June 25, 1948
My dear friends
I should have responded individually to your messages of sympathy but I can’t, and I’m sure you well understand why. My thoughts are not firm, they keep searching for something or someone. My heart is bleeding, my hand is shaking. I look around but everything is dark. I’m missing that little lamp that led me from nowhere to adolescence, and that would have propelled me towards my youth if fate had not put an end to her boundless love.
Who can I ask for comfort? Who can I turn to in this moment of darkness? To passionate love? To friends? Oh no! I have no friends here who can console me, and so I turn to the altar. There is nothing more consoling than prayer. I have turned to it, I have approached the Blessed Sacrament with faith, and I discovered that one does not die in prayer but rather, that is when true life begins. But when I came back to the reality of the world, the pain returned to my soul. My heart is screaming again mamma, Mamma! But my cries go unanswered, like a voice seeking help in the wilderness.
And so here I am asking you for a word of comfort. Yes, I’m really asking you because I know that only you can give it to me. You, who are my only friends. I’m sending you many greetings from my grandmother, uncle, father and Filippo. Your friend. Donato
I also enclose a greeting, the very first, from little Franceschino.
Beyond the Horizon 