MY HERO

In every young man’s soul there is a light that starts shining early, like a gleam of glory that beckons to him, that guides him to the grandiose and exceptional. That spark is the essence of manhood, it is his virile demand for recognition and it represents God’s free gift to all of us to give us a jump start towards individual contribution and success. If that energy is fueled with evil by those who influence closely the young person, he may become a criminal or a tyrant. If that influence is positive, it is a gift that may lead him to great achievements.

I cannot recall exactly how and when it started, but early in childhood I began fantasizing about my uncle Nino, who had emigrated to the United States way back in 1929 and who had become somewhat of an idol to my mother, his sister.

Whenever my mother mentioned him, her tones always suggested class and success; she hinted that Nino had realized what so many other members of the family had intensely dreamed but had never dared to accomplish. She spoke of a dynamic, wealthy life conducted in the magical, superlative, utterly modern metropolis called New York, where buildings rose so tall that they reached clear up to the clouds, where slick, modern automobiles carried millionaires to and fro.

In my mind, I saw my uncle living in a skyscraper and being chauffeured to super modern offices and to elegant restaurants in a gleaming black limousine with white tires. How wonderfully the mind of children carry small hints by adults to extreme limits, building fantasies and images that satisfy their never ending thirst for the grandiose, the improbable and the sublime.

The late forties came, I still had not met my uncle, separated as we were by the war, and an avalanche of American movies started being shown in Italian cinemas.

These flicks depicted American society as a rich, somewhat carefree world, where the display of wealth took form in elegant clothes, automobile, homes, bars, restaurants and so on. I finally found a match between the fantasies I had entertained about uncle Nino’s world and what was shown on the screen. There was also violence in these movies, but the toting of guns and dramatic shootings were for us well below the threshold of violence tolerance we had developed during the bloody world conflict whence we came. In any case the pictures somehow confirmed and gave body to my fantasies about that far away land.

In 1950, with a great deal of stirrings in my family, we learned that Nino was coming for a visit. I cannot describe adequately my feelings of excitement and anticipation. Here was my hero, the man who had done the ultimate deed, who had left our limited and old world for the land paved with gold; he would be coming to see us. We could get first hand reports on his life, his accomplishments, his contacts. I could tap the strength of the man by basking in his warm embrace, absorb the energy, enjoy his protection and his glory.

We met outside Venice, in a little town called Monselice, where two other Nino’s sisters lived (he was the only male of a five children family), both spinsters. When I had asked why he wouldn’t come to our home in Lido, I was told that that was not possible, there were complications. The problem turned out to be that when he left Italy for New York, a woman he had been dating , claiming to be pregnant by him, had gone to my grandmother Rosa, Nino’ mother, and demanded that Nino be forced to return and face up to his parental and marital responsibilities.

But Nino had refused, according to him he had invited her to join him in New York and she in turn had refused to relocate from Venice. In any case, under pressure from Grandma Rosa, a staunch catholic woman, and after a blitz of letters from her, Nino capitulated to marry this woman, but the marriage took place by proxy. Later on he would insist that he had been framed and tried to annul the marriage claiming “non-consummation” .

Before he came to Monselice to meet us, Nino had made a few trips to Italy, unbeknownst to my family; he had entered the country incognito, since he knew that his estranged wife was stalking him, seeking financial support. In his trips to Italy Nino was trying to manage two main tasks: to promote his business, and to try and obtain dissolution of marriage from his estranged wife. The latter was conducted by engaging the work of several attorneys who lobbied at the extreme authority to do marriage dissolutions at the Vatican, the Sacra Rota.

The day I met uncle Nino, I was not aware of his personal woes. Meeting my uncle was an experience I will never forget and it ranks among the most relevant milestones in my teen development. Here came this tall, well dressed gentleman who towered over the somewhat squat relatives, sporting an expensive cashmere dark grey overcoat( it was winter), an elegant Borsalino hat with a black band, gleaming wingtip shoes, a handkerchief in his breast pocket, gold expensive cuff links on an immaculate white shirt, and a beautiful gray and black silk tie.

He enfolded me in his comfortable embrace and left a faint trace of expensive cologne on my sweater. His eyes were deep blue and his graying hair was curly and showing streaks of natural red, just like my mother’s. He had a peculiarly high pitched voice, but his demeanor and his speech were resolute and controlled. We met in local restaurant; he came back from the restroom, summoned the proprietor, and scolded him severely for the unsanitary conditions of the bathroom.

Always Nino, an imposing figure, commanded the attention of whoever sat in the same room with him. He had that magnetic personality that attracts and made him the center of conversation.

His visit was brief, he promised many future encounters, but he left as quickly as he came, leaving me with longing for his presence, his stories, his support.

I heard he finally settled his marriage complications by paying a substantial sum of money to his stalking wife and to the Vatican, and thus obtaining the desired annulment from the Sacra Rota. But it turned out that the woman, who obviously smelled wealth, resumed her stalking and money demands. She happened to befriend a famous tenor, Mario Del Monaco, to whom she was remotely related and managed to get the police after him again.

Nino continued his covert trips to Italy to manage his business. He was an arbitrageur, or a broker who would bring together U.S. corporations and Italian ones, and get handsome commissions from both in case of mergers or acquisitions.

A tragic/comic series of events occurred as a result of his covert trips. Nino did not use his real name, Nino Crosara, and adopted the alias of Nino Grimani, with which he also obtained the United States citizenship and a passport. He deftly borrowed his new name, Grimani, from one of the most prominent and ancient Venetian families. The Grimani had been Doge’s, or Lords of Venice, cardinals and generals.

This choice was probably prompted by admiration but also served niftily in business transactions conducted in the Unites States since it gave him clout. Well, this name came to place him in an almost disastrous situation that has all the nuances of a Giacomo Casanova’s adventure. He once registered with the Grimani name at the hotel Danieli in Venice, one of the most splendid and internationally known hotels in Italy. Suddenly, an irate woman stormed the registration lobby of the hotel. She was the wife of the real Count Grimani who, alerted by some spy and strongly suspecting marital infidelity, was trying to catch and confront her husband on the premises. But Nino was no amateur and commanded a suitably placed number of human radars who allowed him to slip away and disappear before he would be hit with a major scandal.

Once again, Nino was cleared of any obligations and continued to pursue his business interests in Italy. He married Gloria, the daughter of the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain and lived in New York with her, but alas the most beautiful and charming socialite died of cancer in the early 60’s.

Enter Mado (pronounced with accent on the o). This Italian socialite was a countess from Milano. She had been married to Count Frederick Wurm, a German industrialist. She and her husband had been among the darlings of the high society in Germany of the 30’s.Mado told me of great dinner parties attended by Hitler and the Third Reich high ranking figures. She e said of Hitler: “ He seemed polite and subdued, hardly spoke, who would have guessed…….”

After the death of Count Wurm, Mado settled in Milano, but toured the spots of Europe, and she met Nino in Monte Carlo. They married and settled in two spots: Miami Beach in the winter and Rome in the summer. I began to frequent my uncle and Mado in the early 70’s while we lived in Rome, and their life seemed ideal. Mado, although she maintained some of the characteristics of a spoiled child, nonetheless was a woman of great generosity and had a rare enthusiasm for all aspects of life. She adored Nino and, as a reflection, adored me and my family.

Nino continued to guide me as a mentor, but he maintained a subtle peculiar distance when I tried to discuss his business. He was obviously successful; he was often on the phone with prominent and well known business figures. I once pressed Mado for more information but she limited her reply with a mysterious “Nino is genius, a real genius!!..”

Nino’s apartment in Rome, in Via Trieste, was decorated in grandiose fashion, with Italian and French antiques. It was the venue of exquisite parties, where champagne flowed freely and the food was catered by a local restaurant. Nino and Mado would spend time at Terracina, south of Rome, basking in the southern Italian sun and would invite me down, when my family was in the States for the summer.

I would join them at the hotel L’Approdo, jutting into the sea, and I would chauffeur them around the city. Interestingly Nino, a true New Yorker, had never bothered to learn how to drive and get a driver’s license.

I started to realize that Nino was a risk taker and lived at the edge. He would deal with people at the highest levels, and his life, in spite of the outward appearance, was conducted in a fairly high state of tension. I learned that he had had a heart attack some years before. His wife Mado had contracted a pernicious condition called a-plastic anemia which resulted in low blood cell count.

Her doctor explained to me that it was a form of blood cancer and a reversal in her condition was unlikely. This placed additional stress on Nino. He was advised to watch carefully alcohol and stress, but he would often cheat and indulge in his favorite drink, Scotch. I once offered to pitch in and get involved in some of his business dealings but he kept the distance: “I don’t know if you could take the pressure…”

On a September week-end he called me and asked to join him for dinner. We dined at his house in Via Trieste. Mado was in the hospital under observation. He had cooked dinner himself, an unusual event. He seemed tired, his hair was disheveled, a sign of depression in a man who was always meticulously groomed. During dinner he was cursing fate for what was happening to Mado. He started crying softly.

He said he was scared, scared of death. I tried to reassure him and promised I would check with him during the following week. On Monday, at work, I was busy with a new project and time was going fast, the afternoon came and I was pouring over my work, when the telephone rang.

At the other end of the line was my cousin Marina, she was crying and said: “Nino had a massive heart attack and is dead” I rushed over to his home in Via Trieste. Distraught relatives and friends greeted me gloomily. I entered the bedroom.

Nino lay on the double bed in a plastic bag. He was fully dressed and I could see him clearly under the clear plastic He looked like a puppet, his face made of wax and painted. He seemed small and unreal. That was not my hero, that puppet in a dark suit was not him, his flair, his style, his energy, his charm, his zest for life had taken flight, and I knew that indeed we have a soul, a magnificent spirit within and, when our body dies, it soars up, somewhere, but it also lives magnificently inside those that have shared his life.

Nino had shaped my life somehow. Even after I got to know his shortcomings and his opportunistic deeds, I still loved him deeply. He was still my hero.

 

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