An Introduction to Mamma Mia

I want to tell a story about a brave and remarkable woman, but I’m unsure where to begin. From a historical perspective, her life unfolded less than ten years after the Second Great War; she was born in a small mountainside village in central Italy. However, having lived under the influence of a controlling father and then married off to a dominant husband at a very young age, not to mention having had her first four children by the age of twenty, one could argue that her life had never been hers to live. For this reason, I am compelled to make her introduction toward the end.

My father died on November 19, 2020, while isolated in an Italian hospital bed, pneumonia beating up on his lungs. I didn’t hesitate to purchase a plane ticket when I heard he had contracted the virus, knowing it would be his last battle. My urgency was not because of some innate desire to see him before he died (a subject for another time); instead, I feared the chaos that would ensue upon his death. The family dynamics in Italy with my younger siblings were not ideal.

The call came in the day before my flight was scheduled to depart. My sister, herself in the hospital fighting a milder case of COVID-19, could barely get the words out.

“Sam, he’s dead. Dad’s dead.”

Still jet-lagged, I stopped by my mom’s apartment before the burial. She, too, had tested positive, and although asymptomatic, safety protocols prevented her from being in attendance. Losing your husband of fifty-four years is difficult enough as it is, but not being able to mourn his death properly was a tragedy in and of itself.

I watched her from the sidewalk, and she waved at me from the third-floor balcony. On the phone, there was both sadness and anger in her voice.

“Sammy, this isn’t right. It shouldn’t happen this way.”

I can’t begin to express my agony, unable to provide the comfort she needed. The next day, I threw caution to the wind and wrapped my arms around her.

When the time was right, I ventured into my father’s office and began picking away at the mess. My mom did not understand the family finances or where any legal documents might be kept. Unfortunately, my search was fruitless, and I soon realized all that was left were unpaid bills. Decades of trials and toil, and not a dime to be handed over to her.

My mom and I would spend the next five weeks together, mostly reminiscing on days of old, shedding tears of joy and sadness. She recalled memories I must have forgotten over the years (I chalk that up to my concussion earlier in life). The following day, I began to record her stories and learned much about our family history, all recounted from her perspective.

I have hours of audio recordings that I plan to translate, put into writing and share with you. Some of what I heard will be difficult to write, as it sheds a poor light on my father, but I am compelled to tell them nonetheless. These are the Chronicles of Anna Cavaricci.