TRANSCRIPT OF AUDIO FILE:

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT:

CLIENT: How are you?

THERAPIST: I'm doing fine, thank you. Tired maybe, but okay.

CLIENT: (inaudible at 0:00:15). I keep forgetting your check. I'm sorry.

THERAPIST: Okay. That's okay. And (inaudible at 0:00:30), we didn't talk last week. What would you like to do this week?

CLIENT: I can't do Tuesday at 3:45 [this week] (ph), mostly because (pause) I haven't quite figured out what I tell people. [0:00:59]

THERAPIST: I... I'm sorry, go ahead (chuckling).

CLIENT: (Chuckling) (Pause) Yeah, I just can't leave early every week Tuesday and Thursday.

THERAPIST: Sure.

CLIENT: But some weeks are fine.

THERAPIST: Well, I... (Pause) Let's see.

CLIENT: Are [we missing] (ph) two weeks in August?

THERAPIST: Not on my... I will... I haven't figured out this, but I'll probably be gone some or most of the first week of August. Otherwise I'll probably (ph) be around.

CLIENT: I'll be for the third week. (inaudible at 0:01:56) between now and then. [0:01:59]

THERAPIST: Right. (Pause)

CLIENT: So two weeks will be available.

THERAPIST: I have... yeah, I mean, at least through the next few weeks I just sort of have various things available with people being away. So if you wanted to schedule another meeting I can tell you what I've got, and we can see if it works. Yeah? Okay. (Pause) I imagine (pause) times about like this towards the end of the day that are best?

CLIENT: Right in the middle of the day would work, too. It's very... I'm just feeling it out. [0:03:00] And I have all these students. And it's not working that well to leave the students at that time of day, but it's not going to last for that long. So (pause) yeah, I will fall into a rhythm, and I will also feel comfortable telling some people in lab where I'm going. But the summer is not the time to do that, because there's six extra people gone (ph).

THERAPIST: I see. (Pause) Let's see. This week I know that I've got... I have Friday at 9:15. [0:04:00]

CLIENT: [That should work] (ph).

THERAPIST: Yeah? Okay. I'll look. If I have anything that's... I don't think I have 3:30 or 5:15 (pause), otherwise this week. So do you want to say that, or do you want me to (crosstalk)?

CLIENT: I don't know that I strongly prefer the beginning or the end. [0:04:56] I think I just need some variety, beginning or end of the day. I don't know. You shouldn't... we should do Friday at 9:15...

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: (Chuckling) Otherwise you will find yourself going down a hole that you shouldn't worry about. (Pause) [0:06:00] How much about the story of my family, my mom's family, have I told you about? (Pause) It's not a quiz (chuckling).

THERAPIST: (Chuckling) I'll make sure(inaudible at 0:06:45). I don't know, some? Go ahead. (Pause) [0:07:00]

CLIENT: Okay, that doesn't really help me. So my mom's dad is the one who performed our wedding. (inaudible at 0:07:15) And my mom's (inaudible at 0:07:22).

THERAPIST: Right, that's what I (inaudible at 0:0735). I remembered that (inaudible at 0:07:42).

CLIENT: (Chuckling) Well, I won't tell you again. So it's... (Pause) [0:08:00]

THERAPIST: And they're sort of pillars of their community.

CLIENT: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's this whole scene on the community level and also on the family level. They moved to Columbus in 1973 or something. No, maybe a little later. I don't remember exactly when. And there were, like, 15 families. Kentucky, that area, had just begun desegregating schools. My mom went to a black school that was getting white students bused in. [0:09:02] And there were five of them (inaudible at 0:09:10), one sister, two girls and three boys. And now... so they got there. There were no Italian people. And they started just hosting regular sort of ritualistic...

THERAPIST: So wait, sorry, about how old was your mom when they moved there?

CLIENT: She was 13.

THERAPIST: And why did they move?

CLIENT: So before that they lived in Africa. That was a very bad time to be in both those countries. [0:09:59] And I think my grandfather's gig was over. He worked for the government. He had gotten his PhD recently. And he worked... I guess he taught for the government.

THERAPIST: Huh. Like (pause) what?

CLIENT: Science. (Pause) One trend with this side of the family is that... think (ph) the oral tradition of... the oral narrative is... lots of things aren't very specific. So I actually don't know what he did. And I don't think my... if I asked... when I ask my mom she doesn't really tell me anything (crosstalk). [0:11:00]

THERAPIST: I see. Yeah, I mean, [because you were saying your family in (ph) Africa, the government... (chuckling) (inaudible at 0:11:10). Okay, but maybe not to you either.

CLIENT: (Chuckling) I don't know. I don't know why... his PhD was this thing that did not fit him at all. He had four kids. He left to... he got his PhD at Carleton. So he had four kids that left in Italy with Nonna (sp?).

THERAPIST: To go to Ottawa?

CLIENT: Mm-hmm, for two years. So... and my mom was five or four or something. So he visited once in the... however many years it took him, four or five. [0:11:55] And there's this story of him coming to the airport and the family coming to greet him. And he gives her a big hug, because she's the youngest. And she is so upset. She starts crying and crying and crying, she doesn't know who this person is. She's really freaked out.

THERAPIST: She's five?

CLIENT: Yeah. She might have been four.

THERAPIST: Wait, I'm sorry. Again I'm a little confused, because I thought he left to go do the degree when she was four or five.

CLIENT: I don't remember. I don't know. All of this... this is a great example...

THERAPIST: Hazy.

CLIENT: Of how the facts aren't emphasized, whereas if I were to tell a story of Jeremy's family lineage it would be very fact-heavy.

THERAPIST: I follow.

CLIENT: So she... I will find out. [0:12:56] So they moved to...

THERAPIST: Is this me? It could just be my memory, but I usually tend to remember historical stuff reasonably well? I mean, again it may just be my memory. But I wonder too if I'm picking up something of that... it's harder to remember if the facts don't clearly line up, you know?

CLIENT: I think so. Well, I don't know if I've told you about these facts before.

THERAPIST: Those things I don't... the entomology I knew. I think you'd mentioned having been in Africa. Anyway, yeah.

CLIENT: So she was in Africa from eight to thirteen, I think? And I don't know the timing of when he left, when he came back, and when they moved to Africa. But maybe they were in Africa... she was in Africa from five to thirteen. [0:13:54]

THERAPIST: It also struck me that a five-year-old wouldn't sort of...

CLIENT: Wouldn't...

THERAPIST: Even if she wouldn't have recognized him for not having seen him recently, wouldn't understand what it meant for her father... you know what I mean? (Crosstalk)

CLIENT: Okay, she... they moved to Africa when she was five, because I keep hearing mom only lived in Italy for five years. Okay, so most of that time he was gone doing his PhD.

THERAPIST: Yeah, if she was three maybe she would have been confused, or something like that.

CLIENT: Yeah, or two. Two or three. She was in Africa for eight years. That makes more sense. (Pause) So she... so they lived with Nonna, and then my grandfather was floundering. He was... he had failed his quals and didn't... wasn't doing well. So my grandmother left her four children and went to Alaska, for again I don't know how long. [0:15:03] Two years? And my mom and her siblings were raised by my... Nonna's mom? So Nonna's mom and dad lived in this multi-family compound, a lot of people. And they were the upper, upper, upper class (inaudible at 0:15:33) class also, not wealthy at all. They were poor. I mean...

THERAPIST: I see. A lot of status, not much money?

CLIENT: Yeah. But they knew English, they knew how to write (inaudible at 0:15:49). And they knew the texts and the rituals. [0:16:00] And people worshipped them. So there's a shrine of Nonna's mom that's still there, that...

THERAPIST: In the compound or near it?

CLIENT: In the compound, yeah. She had moved out of the compound for the latter part of... the last years of her life just to be with her devotees.

THERAPIST: [What is] (ph) the connection between her and you?

CLIENT: My dad's mom. Yeah, I was born on the lunar calendar day that my dad's mom died. People think that she was reincarnated in me. Right. (Pause) (Chuckling) It makes so much sense. [0:16:58] So (pause) then there was a fifth child because the vasectomy didn't work...

THERAPIST: Right. Oh.

CLIENT: (Laughing) Who is Chelsea (sp?). Chelsea is the youngest in... I mean, all five of these people have such strong personalities.

THERAPIST: All your mom's siblings and your mom.

CLIENT: Yeah, she's the mildest by far. So I don't know when he was born in this timeline, sometime really soon... right before they went to Africa, I think. So then the older two... (Pause) So then it was schooling. Well, there aren't good schools in Africa. So the older two boys went to Paris. The oldest girl, my mom's sister, still lived in Italy for two more years to continue her schooling. [0:18:02] And then my mom and the youngest went to Africa for the first however many years. And then everybody showed up later.

THERAPIST: An incredible amount of turmoil and change for a little kid.

CLIENT: So much.

THERAPIST: Dad's away. At grandmother's house. Mom goes. You move to Africa, but your siblings take off. You have a new little sibling.

CLIENT: (Chuckling) Right. (Pause) Yeah. So he was working for the government, I guess.

THERAPIST: And a daughter who becomes afraid of separation. I mean, it's just...

CLIENT: [I think] (ph) it's important.

THERAPIST: Yeah, it's got to be (crosstalk).

CLIENT: I don't see... (Pause) [0:18:58] I don't see why those things connect. So they had this great life in Africa.

THERAPIST: Oh. (Pause)

CLIENT: I think my mom's way of remembering has the euphoric tint, probably that my way of remembering does, too. So I hear about... they lived in this beautiful government house. And they had servants, and they also had been (ph)... much of the socioeconomic ladder in Italy had servants. It was just, the labor is so cheap. So they had servants in Italy, too. But in Africa I think it was... most people didn't have servants. [0:19:58]

THERAPIST: I see. So they kind of have money in Africa.

CLIENT: Yeah, and they would go on vacation to... (Pause) They would go on vacation to various places, which I am now forgetting. Morocco, Turkey, spend time near the Nile. And they would go to the pool club. But they were very conservative, and most people around were Muslim. And my mom went to a Catholic school in Africa. So the -Italy-centricness (sp?) I think was... had been forming. [0:21:02] I mean, obviously it was a huge part, their life in Italy, preserving their class and their status and their role. But then moving to Africa I think it was all the more strengthened. (Pause)

THERAPIST: Huh. Although your grandfather also chose to do things that took him very far away.

CLIENT: Yeah. Education seemed to be more important than anything. (Pause)

THERAPIST: Although I'm sure he could have done stuff... I mean, he could have done... I mean, maybe not for the schooling... [0:22:00]

CLIENT: No, you can't get a... he wasn't smart enough, I think, to go to the top ranked school in Italy.

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: My dad did. And he was able to get a full ride for his PhD in the US, which no one... it's very hard. So there... I don't know what it was that took him so far away. I wouldn't be surprised also if what you're getting at is... he wanted to be far away.

THERAPIST: Yeah, there was some kind of tension.

CLIENT: That makes sense to me, knowing him. (Pause) [0:22:58] But he did so poorly out there. The way he tells it, he really needed Nonna (inaudible at 0:23:08). (Pause) She has something... PhD stands for (pause) Push Husband... (Pause) Maybe she says it's PHT, Push Husband Through? Anyway, she says my mom played that role for my dad, too. (Pause) [0:24:00] He says he was depressed and out of sorts maybe for the only time in his life during his PhD. My mom was a very (inaudible at 0:24:14). (Pause) So they make this big decision to move to the US, and the reason cited is, the kids aren't smart enough to all go to the best schools in Italy, because I think his job was over, and they had to move. Or it was getting too violent. So going to America was the only way to educate five children and have them all be able to get good jobs. [0:24:56] So all five of them went to Penn State. And they showed up. Nonna didn't have a job for a while. They knew one family.

THERAPIST: Sorry, I have one more question. So why would it have been so crucial for them to go to the best schools in Italy if they had gone back?

CLIENT: Because their life wouldn't have been very good otherwise.

THERAPIST: There's a bigger difference?

CLIENT: I think they wanted them... they wanted the best possible life in the whole world for their children.

THERAPIST: Sure.

CLIENT: And that was going to be in America.

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: But the way to get to America is to do really well at the top school in Italy and go later, like my dad did, or (pause) emigrate. [0:26:07]

THERAPIST: As another route.

CLIENT: Yeah.

THERAPIST: Different from your dad.

CLIENT: Right. I think that's a good question, though. I may find out more. (Pause) So that was a very hard time. Nonna worked. My mom was teased. She didn't fit in. She was kind of fat. (Pause) Yeah, it's not the South, but it was the South. It was more the South back then than it is now.

THERAPIST: Sure. [0:26:58]

CLIENT: So had this pretty intense nucleation of this warm, loving immigrant family that hosted every other Italian immigrant that came to that area. So my dad was one of them. He stayed with them when he first got to the country. My mom was 17 or something at that time.

THERAPIST: Oh. And how old was he (inaudible at 0:27:33?

CLIENT: 20. [I think actually] (ph) he was 21. And they got married when he was... I don't know. 30? 29? And there was a seven year difference, five, seven years, which is something Jeremy can't believe, that I don't know their ages or what year they were born or what year they were married or how far apart they are. [0:28:08] Every time I ask I forget. (Pause) He was born in 1953. That I have remembered for a while. (Pause)

THERAPIST: Yeah, didn't he just turn 60?

CLIENT: Mm-hmm. [It was easy] (ph).

THERAPIST: (Chuckling) When you just wrote him this (inaudible at 0:28:38) speech?

CLIENT: She was born... she might have been born in 1958. Turning 55 maybe? [0:28:56] So that means that she would have been 16, like I said, when he came. And he was 21. (Pause) Fast forward, they built this church. It's expanded to this 2,000-person hall. And their membership is about 1,200 families, which means those people pay every year? So that's 4,000 or 5,000 people who are affiliated with members. And then...

THERAPIST: It's a pretty big congregation.

CLIENT: And then apparently 5,000 more people will just come. (Pause) [0:29:55] But it's not very organized. People just come when they want to for anything. And... have you been to a Hindu temple? (Pause) Very free, very freeing and free. So the word congregation feels wrong.

THERAPIST: I see.

CLIENT: But I don't know what it would be. Also you don't have to... there's no such thing as converting. Many people come who aren't religious who just want to be part of the community, because they're Italian. Some people come who feel like they are who aren't Italian. [0:30:57] So they started by doing these weekly reading some text, some (pause) parable? What's a type of story that teaches you a lesson?

THERAPIST: Yeah, a parable.

CLIENT: It's parabolic?

THERAPIST: That's different, but yeah. (inaudible at 0:31:28) parabola, though. (Pause)

CLIENT: There are a couple parables that get... that are auspicious to read. And you... the lesson are about telling the truth and remembering to eat the offering as a blessing to yourself, and keeping your promises, and this and that. [0:32:02] So this is what we did this weekend. We went there to celebrate our first anniversary with them. (Pause) It was really important to me, because I missed this the day after my wedding. So this... (Pause). And it's often done when people want to give thanks. [0:32:58] So this was done the day after my wedding. So I felt... it felt pretty shitty to miss it, so that day I was like, we will go next year. But it's very hard to get personal attention in Columbus, because two of the siblings live there, Chelsea, the youngest, and the oldest girl. I call her Jacqueline (sp?). They live there.

THERAPIST: She's the oldest sibling, or the second oldest?

CLIENT: She's the second oldest. And Nonna and Nana (sp?) have this huge network of people that they counsel. Nonna still performs (inaudible at 0:33:46), and then Nana does two a day on weekends sometimes. And it's just a big family. [0:33:59] And everybody is really close. So Jacqueline's husband Joey (sp?) is turning 65. So he also wanted to do a ceremony. And then, when my brother heard that we were arriving on his birthday which was Friday, we sort of tried to get him to come, and he did. So he had his own. He also wanted to do a ceremony. Or it was like, you should do a ceremony for your birthday. So we didn't really have our own thing at all. But Chelsea's children were also there, and Jacqueline and Joey's children and their spouses. And one of them has two children also. So there are five children that Nonna and Nana (sp?) have. [0:34:59] Each one has a boy and a girl.

THERAPIST: Each of...?

CLIENT: Five children.

THERAPIST: Okay, right, so they have ten grandkids.

CLIENT: There's ten grandkids. And then the oldest grandkid has two boys. The oldest grandkid (crosstalk).

THERAPIST: They have two great-grandkids.

CLIENT: Mm-hmm. So all their grandkids and great-grandkids were there except four. So it ended up being that all the grandkids are going to perform the puja. And they invited 60 people, which means that it was in the small room, for Joey's 65th birthday. And it's a big year for him, because he is a VP, and he is retiring. (Pause) [0:36:00] (Chuckling) How's it going?

THERAPIST: (Chuckling) Okay. (Pause)

CLIENT: So I noticed a lot of things for the first time this visit. All ten grandchildren and five children and Nonna, Nana get together twice a year for a week at a time until I was 22. So we never missed a year. [0:36:57] And this is the family gathering that has brought to the surface historically or provoked the most memorable and profound sadness for me. (Pause) Not anymore. I'm pretty... it's fine for me now for somebody to leave (ph). (Pause)

THERAPIST: When did that change?

CLIENT: Well, we sort of stopped the super-regular routine of a beach week in the summer...

THERAPIST: When you were 22, uh-huh.

CLIENT: And of Christmas week in December. The beach thing sort of stopped earlier. The Christmas thing is still going, but I spent that week with Jeremy's family last year. [0:38:00] I think it stopped (pause) probably when I got to college. A lot of it had to do with Claire (sp?), the oldest grandchild, who has two sons.

THERAPIST: Mm-hmm, your mom's oldest brother?

CLIENT: My mom's... actually her sister. So the sister had children... got married and had children first.

THERAPIST: Okay.

CLIENT: Then (inaudible at 0:38:32). (Pause) But yeah, there were... from age zero until maybe fourteen, I would just cry and cry and cry, cry the last day, cry in the car, cry at home. [0:39:00] (Pause) (Chuckling) And still my dad asked me if I was sad yesterday, which was really nice, I think because I sounded sad. But I was just tired. And he was like, yeah, even though you were sad so much, all the time, sad every time, it never really lasted for that long (pause) which I think is true, because I think that was what they paid attention to. (Pause) This is part of her (ph) separation (inaudible at 0:39:51). (Pause) [0:40:01]

So, if you want to spend any time with Nonna and Nana when other people aren't around or when the phone isn't ringing, you have to show up from 6:30 to 7:30 in the morning. That was what Jeremy and I did on Saturday morning. And these days they're the happiest people in the world to split a medium coffee. (Pause) [0:40:59] But it's this big group effort. It's like, even when we're trying to see them alone, people hear (ph) (inaudible at 0:41:09) mama means mother's brother. Larry (sp?) mama heard us talking. He was like, well, I know it's painful. But this is what I do to get time with them. I show up at 6:30. I show up with a coffee. And this is where the coffee shop is. And they like two creams, and this and that. And it's like... other people are like, you're going to do that, wake up at 6:30? It's... and there's a lot of sort of... so much laughing and drinking and sitting around and talking until very late at night. [0:41:55] So we left early and went to bed at 1:00 on Friday.

But yeah, we did it, and it was so lovely to spend time with them. They are... (Pause) They are so amazing. Nonna especially. Nana sort of gives off this... well, I don't know. I think he's... (Pause) He's feeling a lot of darkness or experiencing a lot of darkness in his later life. I think his personality is just more volatile. But we were talking about...

THERAPIST: It's about the end, but go ahead.

CLIENT: We were talking about meditation and actually (inaudible at 0:42:58) I guess. [0:43:01] And she clearly (pause) has a lot of it, even though she's this super loud, very dynamic sort of planner-coordinator, didactic, very loving grandmotherly, motherly. She's very even in terms of her... the way she relates to the world, I think. So I asked her, when did you notice this, or when did you acquire this, start to acquire? And first she said, it's from her mother. Then she said, oh, when I was four... she had two answers. When she was... it started when she was four. And then her other answer is, well, it started in her past life. [0:44:00] (Pause) I guess that's all [I'll say] (ph).

THERAPIST: Okay. (Pause)

CLIENT: It's a very intense scene.

THERAPIST: Yeah, (inaudible at 0:44:40). (Pause) Yeah, we should stop. [0:44:58]

CLIENT: So unsatisfying. There's so much to say. (Pause) See you Thursday.

THERAPIST: See you then.

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