Sicilian Style…
Sicily is a rich land of customs and traditions, some weird and annoying but most extremely endearing and often entertaining. Goodbyes are no different.
After dinner time, an increasing number of extended family members and villagers, all hauling chairs like zombies through the dark streets, would arrive at my grandmother’s house. They were all excited for the daily nighttime gathering.
It’s a ritual consisting of almost anyone coming to our house and strategically placing their own chairs from home on the sidewalk and street in front.
Their expectations were small. We were to serve them sweet iced espresso in tiny cups on demand and cool water from the spring fountain whilst entertaining them, playing hosts, storytelling and acting as referees. Discussions, arguments, politics, singing, adventures, jokes, religion… it would go on until very late into the night. If it happened to be the night before our departure from the great island, well, then it could last almost until dawn.
They didn’t want us to leave and we didn’t want to go. They wanted us to stay and spend as much time with them as possible. For love of family, love of conversation and sharing life’s stories, so we could all enjoy more of the essences of life that the family provided.
One evening, before our departure, the nighttime gathering ended so exceedingly late that we passed out cold almost instantaneously. Two hours later we couldn’t hear the family banging on our door to wake us up to leave for the airport. By the time we got into a car we were astoundingly late for the flight. This led to an eye poppingly fast caravan of speeding little Italian cars, in the wee hours of the morning, racing through winding roads towards the airport like an out of control string of pearls. We weren’t headed for the airport main entrance. Somehow the tall metal gates of the security razor wire fence that normally surrounded the airport were flung wide open by someone and the string of pearls zipped right through and onto the runways. My uncle must have called in a favor, I thought.
Our plane sat on the Punta Raisi airport tarmac with a large rolling staircase, also known as airstairs, leading from the asphalt up to the open plane door. At the top were two irritated stewardesses both with hands on hips to help visually communicate their frustrations.
The caravan of cars screeched to a simultaneous skidding stop and the clown cars of relatives, who had come out to see us off, emptied out of each vehicle like bees from a hive. We grabbed all the suitcases and my uncle handed the large ones to the man waiting by the open belly of the plane which had been left open waiting for our arrival. I suddenly realized that there had been absolutely no security check of any luggage, they hadn’t even weighed them.
We ran around the crowd of family members and said our goodbyes, the stewardesses yelling from above to get on board. At this point the pilot had also joined them for emphasis and joined in the screaming. My uncle yelled back something in deep dialect and the three seemed to calm down a bit.
I was finding it strange that as we said goodbye and took a step on the airstair, the family was not receding. They were climbing the stairs along with us. It was a painfully slow climb, combining a blind but careful step backwards with hugs and lots of kisses.
Finally we made it to the top, but the family did not relent. A few of the children had made their way up, not so much to say goodbye, but to take a look inside the plane. Many of them had never flown anywhere. The stewardesses and pilot quickly shooed them out. Arguments and discussions ensued and the family finally started to retreat, most walking backwards down the airstairs to not lose the last view of us before we entered the plane.
We furiously waved. I remember tears running down my cheeks as the whole event had been quite frantic, dramatic and filled with love and longing. We entered the plane to an audience of over a hundred extremely irate passengers. Everyone was staring at us, many with shaking heads, and mumbling all sorts of not-niceties. Rightfully so, I thought. We had delayed the plane takeoff by almost three quarters of an hour. We reluctantly but carefully took our seats.
Through the window we could see the whole family standing on the tarmac, waving up at us. I wondered if such a crowd of families was normally allowed on a runway. My uncle had recruited a couple of my cousins to roll the airstair away from the plane that was already moving. A stewardess began shutting the door in the wide open air whilst the pilot made his way to the takeoff runway.
The plane’s speed picked up very quickly. It was soon moving as fast as those little Italian cars had been just a short time earlier. The tires on the plane achingly screeched at every corner, obviously not designed for this type of extreme maneuver. Each time the plane swerved around we caught the view of the family, frantically waving at the plane. Some had climbed to the top of the airstair, which was just sitting in the middle of the tarmac, to get a higher view and better opportunity to wave goodbye.
The loudest screech was saved for the final corner to the takeoff runway. The pilot must have broken some kind of plane land speed record at this point. Halfway through the 180 degree turn, tires screeching and without the plane even pointing in the right direction, the pilot slammed back the throttle controls and the engines roared loudly into full blast. All the passengers were dramatically slammed back into their seats from the force.
The plane completed the turn at almost full speed due to the relentless jet propulsion. Then the plane roared off like a slingshot down the runway and almost immediately into the air, Just barely missing the mountains on the other side followed by a sharp left turn towards the Mediterranean.
The whole departure process and goodbyes had been one of the most frantic and intense I had ever experienced. From the relentless visitors the night before, the two hours of sleep finally culminating in the action packed movie climax of a takeoff. I was absolutely exhausted.
What I learned very young and was practically forced to embrace was the fact that goodbyes are crucial events in life. Goodbyes were important because there was a deep feeling of the preciousness of life, a strong gratitude for our loved ones and a clear, persistent and deep understanding of how unpredictably temporary all of our crazy lives can be. No one would have admitted it, but at least subconsciously, we simply didn’t know if it would be the last time we saw each other.
If it was the last time we would make it an extremely memorable one!
By the way… The plane landed in Rome 10 minutes early that day!
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The Importance of Goodbye I… Every Goodbye Should be a Memento Mori
Renato Passalacqua 