God only knows what went through Maria Gatti-Latini’s mind that day.
God only knows what went through the minds of the people with whom she came in contact that day.
But Maria was on a mission.
Maria’s youngest daughter Palma had recently moved with her husband and young family to a new home in Queens Village — along with her kid brother Fiore, who purchased a twin house two blocks away for his own family — fulfilling the American Dream but leaving the nest of their parent’s home at 1466 Vyse Avenue, in the South Bronx between Hunts Point and Fordham. The newly built abodes were in the eastern part of Queens County, about 16 to 20 miles (depending on the route) away.
These days the trip between those two venues could take anywhere from 30 to 50 minutes by car depending on traffic, and GoogleMaps doesn’t even offer an option for public transportation. But Maria knew her options at the time, and her mission was clear.
Now that Palma was on her own, Maria figured, she was going to need a “spianatoia” – a board on which to roll out her pasta. Never mind that Palma never made pasta – this first generation Italo-American hated to get her hands sticky, and besides, always relied on her mother to make the pasta. Maybe Maria was just looking to not have to carry her own board over to Palma’s house when she visited. Or maybe Maria was just looking for an excuse to drop by and see her daughter.
[Maria’s nieces in Anagni, Italy on their own spianatoie, probably around 1990 – left Claudia Latini, Above Rossana Gatti]
Maria’s first stop that day was a local Bronx lumber yard. She told them she wanted a flat board; when they asked her how wide, she spread her arms out in a measure well practiced over half a century to indicate the width, and then motioned in a similarly automated gesture to indicate the depth. She told them it needed a stop to hold it to the counter against the pressure of the rolling and kneading, so made them affix a ½” x ½” strip and nailed it to the board for her. Best yet, she told them that for her to carry it to its intended destination, they needed to fashion a rope handle to the board, which was about 2’ x 2’.
God only knows what went through the minds of the men working at the lumber yard that day.
Then Maria got on the bus.
Somehow she knew which bus to take from the South Bronx to Queens Village, which I’m guessing had to include a terminal change between boroughs. She boarded the bus she believed to be the right one, but wanted to verify.
“Does this-a bus go to Queens-a Village?”
The driver, as impatient as he was impertinent, had just posted the destination on the bus headsign, and so inquired of Maria, “What’s the matter with you lady, can’t you read?”
Great question for our chairwoman of the board, who, illiteracy notwithstanding, ran a farm in Italy so well that her father left her an inheritance customarily due only to a son. Our board woman who, in her youth, would walk 3 to 10 miles round-trip each day from her home in Anagni center to her family’s fields in the countryside (“ai Monti”). Our lady of the spianatoia who, during harvest season, would walk 30 miles from Anagni to Frascati to work for hire picking grapes. Our fearless adventurer who, at 26 years old, of her own volition and without chaperone, boarded a freighter from Naples with her 6-year-old daughter to cross the ocean to rejoin her husband, after being separated by as many years thanks to World War I, to make a new home in New York.
“NO, I can’t,” she boldly replied, as if he should have known that.
The driver sheepishly apologized; he then guided her to the corner of 112th Avenue and 227th Street, and pointed her in the general direction of the address on the slip of paper she carried.
God only knows what went through the bus driver’s mind that day.
Maria had only been to Queens Village once or twice before, driven by her son or son-in-law, so that day she couldn’t quite pick out the exact house.
No, my dear millennials, she had no cell phone, and no GPS.
She had something better.
She had “the whistle.”
On a sunny day in 1955, a stout 5’0” 62-year-old woman walked up and down 112th avenue whistling the notes C, C, down to A (musical identification courtesy of cousin Joe Latini), a call sounding something like “fee-fee-few” that in its Pavlovian way summoned at least three generations of children that I know of (including me and mine) from whatever they were doing to let them know that their parent wanted them. Now. Right now.
God only knows what went through the minds of our Queens Village neighbors that day.
Palma was on the phone at the time and thought she was hearing things – from her childhood. As “the whistle” persisted, she finally and incredulously put the phone down and looked out in the street to find, much to her surprise, her mother.
God only knows what went through Palma’s mind that day.
“Mom, what are you doing in the middle of the street?
Come on in and let’s make some pasta.”
They undoubtedly had a wonderful visit. And to this day, I have a wonderful spianatoia.
[Palma’s Spianatoia, close up to see the lip Maria had the lumber yard add for her…]
So The Story Goes Like This... 
louise and ellie remember the first home in the south bronx.my mom stayed there when she went to dress making school .they have wonderful memories .we are sitting in the airport reading your story and discussing the details .
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You summon the boys with a whistle? That thing looks like a piece of plywood with a ballister attached. I’ll have to make one. I’ve never made homemade pasta and I’m dying to try the “well” method.
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Of course I do! The high pitch gets through the sound of Xbox and other assorted interferences. It’s a family whistle so it’s not degrading. And yes, essentially that’s what it was — My grandmother’s was solid wood (oak?) but for the “travel version” she had it fashioned out of plywood. It still does the job, though it’s fraying on the edges these days. Nothing beats homemade pasta, and it ‘s really not that hard to do.
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