To Find a Mountain

Chapter Eight

I briefly forgot an Italian tradition, a way of life, and because of that I began to get angry with Zizi Checcone.

She arrived the day after my father told me she would come to help me take care of the children as well as the Germanesí. With a bundle over her shoulder, she trudged wearily up the hill to the house and arrived at the front door with beads of perspiration on her brow and very short of breath. She had on a thick black dress which had probably heated up quite well underneath the sun.

We welcomed her inside; Emidio and Iole rushed to her and threw their arms around her thick waist and legs.

“Zizi Checcone, are you really going to stay with us?” Iole said.

“If you want me to,” she said, a small smile tugging at the corner of her mouth.

Both of them cried out “Yes! Yes!”

She raised her black eyes toward me and I smiled at her.

“It’s good to have you here, Zizi Checcone,” I said. “Let me take your bag up to Papa’s room.”

“Oh, I don’t need a room, I can sleep in the kitchen,” she said. “Or maybe out here on the floor with a blanket…”

“Papa gave us strict instructions,” I said. “You are to sleep in his room.”

With that, I hoisted her bag over my shoulder and went up to Papa’s room, which I had just cleaned.

When I came back down, Zizi Checcone was standing in front of the big table, her hands in front of her, looking at the big black pot being heated over the fire. I was about to start a batch of minestrone.

“How are you doing Zizi Checcone?” I said. I started chopping vegetables, wondering when she was going to come and help me.

“I am well, Benedetta, thank you. There is always much work to be done, even though I am by myself and have no one else to take care of,” she said. “The problem with that is there is also no one to help.”

Talk about no help, I thought to myself, hoisting another log onto the fire. I looked out of the corner of my eye at her, sitting in a chair, her hands folded in her lap.

She told me about how her land had not been properly prepared for crops and that was why her harvest had not been as bountiful as she hoped. For ten minutes she talked while I chopped garlic, sliced tomatoes and cleaned vegetables, all with no offer of help from the woman who had been brought here specifically to help me.

“It is hard to be the head of a household,” she said. “Much to do. Much responsibility. And it is not always easy to ask for help.”

I nodded.

“When a man leaves, the woman is suddenly in charge, and she is not always ready for that.”

I plunked beans into the soup that was still too thin. There was no point in listening to her, she was repeating herself.

“Women suddenly have to do things the world has not prepared them for,” she said.

She was like a broken record, all this talk of women being heads of the household, that’s what happens when men leave for the mountains. Suddenly, my hands froze.

Women in charge, when men are gone. I felt my face flush and turned to look at her. She had her eyes lowered, she was wringing her hands.

She was waiting for me to ask her to help. How foolish of me! Here I was getting angry with her, chastising her in my mind for being lazy and unhelpful, when she was simply being respectful toward me. Not wanting to overstep her bounds, and insult me. Sometimes I was a stupid girl.

“Zizi Checcone,” I said, and she looked up quickly. “Since my father is not here, I wonder if I could ask you to help me. There is so much to do for the Germans, for Iole and Emidio, for the house, I would appreciate any help you could give me.”

She jumped up and her hand came out of a small bag next to her feet. It was a jar of tomato sauce.

“I would love to,” she said. “Let’s start by thickening this soup up.” She dumped the tomato sauce in.

“How much bread do we have?” she asked.

“I’ve got two loaves.”

“Benedetta, why don’t you start a fire in the bread oven and I will begin making the dough.”

I started to go, but she stopped me.

“Is there much laundry to be done?” she said.

“Piles and piles,” I answered.

“Do you know how to clean clothes with ash from the fireplace?” she asked.

“What are you talking about?” I said.

“When the bread is done, and after dinner, we will use the ash to clean the clothes,” she said.

“How does that work?”

“We’ll fill a large wooden tub with water outside, add the ash, bring it to a boil, and then the ash will sink to the bottom. When it does, the water above it will have a slick quality to it that cleans even the dirtiest clothes. Soap is very hard to come by these days.”

“All right,” I said. “I’ll start the oven.”

“Very good, Benedetta. Thank you.”

I heard the tone of her voice and she was smiling at me, a twinkle in her eye.

“No, Zizi Checcone, thank you.” I meant it, I knew I could learn a lot from Zizi Checcone.

I stepped outside, happy to have behaved properly (eventually) and displayed the manners my mother and father had taught me.