December 31, 1974

San Silvestro

            Just when did grapes get so expensive? November? Well, when you wanted them in the dead of winter, they had to be imported from Northern Africa and that cost money. An exotic explanation of their costliness was gratifying but really not necessary as long as Maria Rosa had her grapes for New Year’s Eve.

Maria Rosa liked spending money. She bought a new item of clothing just about every week and threw her old clothes in the trash (where the maid usually retrieved them and used them for herself or her friends and family or her parish). Maria Rosa tossed out food that was a day old before purchasing new food so the refrigerator looked empty when she returned to fill it. If she didn’t like the taste of something, she just left it on her plate. Her wines all had one main characteristic: they were the best that money could buy. That divine little soupçon of financial dearness is what conferred heady bouquet and pleasing body on her Tuscan Reds as far as she was concerned.

Maria Rosa’s house was a showpiece in comfort and prestige coupled with a complete lack of personality. Everyone felt at ease when they walked in; there were fashionable kilim carpets on her seasoned hardwood floors and great big cushy armchairs and sofas. The televisions were always placed to maximum advantage in each room, and the house was overheated in the winter. 
      But her home had no character at all, and despite Maria Rosa’s easy and welcoming smile, no one could ever remember exactly what she had been talking about because she was as vapid as a dragonfly. Yes, a dragonfly: pretty to look at but if you wanted to eat it, well, there just wasn’t enough meat there for a sick grasshopper.

Her husband worshiped her, her children adored her and anyone she selected for a friend was devoted to her. To everyone else: servants, shop assistants and undesired relatives she had all the manners and refinement of a fire hydrant: not bad manners, just no manners. She really didn’t care what other people thought as long as she could continue living in her own, perfectly constructed little world with her perfect home and her perfect wardrobe and her perfect children.

All the same no one hated her. There was really nothing to hate since there wasn’t much there to begin with. When the people she didn’t like, realized how sterile Maria Rosa’s heart and soul were, they simply steered away from her. This is not to say Maria Rosa was a bad person: she was not purposefully cruel or hateful, she was simply spoiled rotten and had learned she really did not need to be nice to people she did not care for. Quickly, a tacit compromise was reached with the unwanted masses and for the most part, they simply avoided her. There is no friction if there is no contact.

    Tonight however promised to be different. She was having thirty people over for her New Year’s Eve Party, and among them her brother- and sister-in-law. Maria Rosa’s husband Raffaele didn’t particularly care for his brother-in-law so Maria Rosa made sure Raffaele were dreading Marta and Franco’s arrival that evening. Maybe he would learn not to invite them in the future.

But family is family and they did occasionally have to come together socially, even if Maria Rosa did not even pretend to be nice. She would just scuttle Marta and her brother Franco into a little room off the kitchen where there was a television set and hope that her in-laws wouldn’t embarrass her in front of her really well-to-do, truly chic friends. Indeed, that little room off the kitchen is exactly where Marta and Franco were hoping to find refuge; Maria Rosa would have been wounded to the core if she had known and what a low opinion Marta had of Maria Rosa, but only because Marta was family and Maria Rosa occasionally needed Franco’s services as a dermatologist. Maria Rosa would never find out anyway, because nobody would bother to gossip about it. 
     Marta had learned to avoid the mere subject of her sister-in-law even in conversation with friends and family members. There was very little Marta could say that was pleasant about Maria Rosa, and an unpleasant comment would only hurt Raffaele and his children.

Maria Rosa had everything planned the entire party to a “t.” The champagne – six bottles of Berlucchi to drink at midnight and then plenty of good Prosecco to follow it with, had been chilling in the garden all day. She had corralled the children into making her elaborate hors d’oeuvres, crusted wonders bejewelled with chunks of mortadella, a rainbow of chutneyed fruits and vegetables, adorable pink shrimp, glistening pickles, nice fat salmon, and gleaming white and yellow and cheeses from the Veneto, platters that took an hour to fashion and twenty minutes to polish off. She had a new dress for the occasion and she would wear the drop pearl earrings Raffaele had given her for Christmas.  
     Maria Rosa had also decided to revive the old custom of lighting a bonfire at midnight, and told all of her guests to bring something from the past year that they wanted to throw into the flames as an augury for the year to come. She had made her son set up an awning in the garden in case it rained. Everything was perfect at half past five, so she proceeded to henna her hair and give herself a facial. Disaster struck.

     The maid slipped and broke her ankle. Maria Rosa came running out of the bathroom when she heard the thud, her hair wrapped in African mud and aluminium foil, her face covered in a dark grey cleansing masque. She pulled her terrycloth robe around her as she knelt over the poor woman and called for her husband.

“Raffaele! Call an ambulance! No no, we are not going to accompany her; call her daughter. We have thirty people arriving in two hours and we will never be ready if we go. Just call Milena and tell her we have sent her mother to the emergency room and she should meet her there!”

“But Maria Rosa, . . .”

“NOW!” came a fierce scream from all that dirt and metal and grey gunk. Maria Rosa looked pretty frightening and Raffaele followed her dictates to the letter. Maria Rosa went to the back garden with a towel, scooped some of the ice out of the wine coolers and made a bundle to put on the maid’s ankle. Then she swooped back to the bathroom lest her hair come out bright orange.

Her hair color was slightly more russet than she had intended, but there was nothing to do about it now. As she made up her face, she barked orders at the children who scrambled around the house, picking things up, moving furniture, taking the doors off hinges. The ambulance arrived at a quarter past seven. Raffaele wasn't even showered and the guests would be arriving in forty-five minutes. 
        As Maria Rosa yanked on her pantyhose, she listed the items her husband was to wear, and as she put on her jewels she hissed at the children to disappear upstairs. As she was pulling her dress over her head, the doorbell rang, at ten minutes to eight.

     “Good God, doesn’t anybody know you’re not supposed to arrive early at a party?” she fumed as she strapped on her shoes and marched to the front door. Maria Rosa plastered a big welcoming smile on her face and swept the door open with grand aplomb, lest anyone think she did not have the situation under control.

“Happy New Year Maria Rosa!”

It was her sister-in-law and brother-in-law. The smile dropped out of Maria Rosa’s face like an anvil and she motioned hurriedly for them to come in.

“I have to finish dressing, why don’t you take your coats off and have a glass of wine?” was what Marta and Franco heard. What they saw, was the back of Maria Rosa’s head retreating to the back of the house with its bedrooms.

Franco looked at Marta and smiled. “There’s that little room off the kitchen; why don’t we put our coats back there? I don’t think this is a good time to take them to the bedroom where she usually puts them.”

Franco was anxious to keep Marta from dwelling on how blatantly unkind her sister-in-law was. This evening wasn't going to be pleasant for him either, but at least Marta didn’t have a Maria Rosa married to her brother.

By the time they had got their coats off and Franco had poured both of them a glass of white wine, Raffaele came into the kitchen. He was dressed in a handsome Missoni cardigan that was the height of fashion and he smelled like a forest scrubbed with citron and bergamot. Raffaele took one look at Franco’s blazer and sneered.

     “What’s this?” He fingered Franco’s coat pocket-handkerchief. “Don’t you know nobody wears these anymore?”

Raffaele now remembered just how much he disliked his brother-in-law.

“Oh, it’s just a touch of colour. Plus I never know when a lady might need it to cry into.”

Raffaele now greeted his sister and they exchanged best wishes. The doorbell rang and the first “real” guests arrived.

“Raffaele, where’s the maid? I can’t believe Maria Rosa is doing this all on her own.”

Maria Rosa heard this as she walked into the kitchen. “The stupid bumpkin fell and broke her ankle. But we shall make do, shan’t we? What is family for, if not to help out in a situation like this? Do be a darling Franco, and open up some bottles of wine for me, won’t you?” Maria Rosa smiled genuinely for the first time that evening. “And Marta, could you turn the oven on for me? I have puff pastry that needs to come out in about, oh twenty minutes.”

“Oh Maria Rosa, we’ll be glad to help. Come on Raffaele, what is family for?” They both metaphorically rolled up their sleeves and popped wine bottles and filled trays with food. 
     The guests, a predictable mix of middle-aged women with necklines that plunged to their wobbling bellybuttons and their greying husbands wearing big gold Rolex or Baume and Mercier watches, trickled in. Soon the living room and dining room were filled with smoke and chatter and the occasional chortle from Maria Rosa sounding above everything. Raffaele and Marta smiled at these old acquaintances and conversed amiably. Some of the women offered to help Maria Rosa clear and the men would take the bottles Raffaele had opened, and go around the room pouring wine for the ladies. It was a lovely party, and everyone was mixing quite delightfully.

     “Did you make this bread, this piadina?” an older woman with a high neckline and very little jewellery, asked Marta in the kitchen. She was helping Marta prepare a new tray of food.

“Oh no, I really am not very good at making it.”

“Such a pity, I was so looking forward to finding out how it is done.” 
        The woman smiled at Marta, with that openness in the eyes that surfaces, when you meet someone for the first time and you just really like each other immediately. Click! Marta started to explain the recipe and the rolling pin and terracotta “pan,” while the woman took out a cigarette case and lit up. She offered Marta a cigarette as well, and for the first time in two days, Marta lit up, too. The ladies became so engrossed in their conversation that they ended up moving to the little room off the kitchen, where they opened the window for some fresh air and sat and chatted.

Maria Rosa appeared in the doorway. “Marta, you know what I said about smoking in this room,” she intoned with icy sweetness. As Maria Rosa advanced into the room and saw her Countess guest smoking, she quickly added: “Don’t tell the children!” laughing as she glided back into the kitchen and put together a tray of food that she personally took out to the dining room.

“Raffaele!” Maria Rosa whispered with her eyes at her husband across the room. “Raffaele, come here now!” read the darts she shot into his pupils. Raffaele made his way across the room and asked if there was something she needed.

          “Yes. Guess who your sister is talking to?”

“Her husband?”

“No, the Countess Gamba Guiccioli. In the maid's room. Go see if you can free the poor countess. I am sure she’s just being polite and must be bored to tears.”

When Raffaele arrived, he found Franco in there as well, smoking his pipe and listening to the two ladies chatting.

“Oh, Adriana, I see you’ve met my sister and brother-in-law. Here, let me freshen up your drink.”

“Oh no, I’m fine thank you. This is such a lovely party: there are so many nice people here.”

“Oh, have you met Egisto Morigia? He is one of my closest friends and I believe he shares your interest in horses. Really, you must come and let me introduce you. Here Franco, why don’t I turn the television on for you? They’re showing one of those old black and white movies you’re so crazy about.”

The Countess Adriana Gamba Guiccioli turned to Marta and winced as she rose and said: “It was such a delight to meet you. If you’re ever out driving around Northern Tuscany, do drop by the vineyard; I’m almost always there someplace, up to my patootie in mud.”

Raffaele could hardly believe his ears. Well, there was no accounting for people’s taste. The Countess was probably just being kind.

      “Franco, do you think we could leave right after midnight? I’d like to get an early start, driving back to Verona tomorrow.”

Franco turned the television off and nodded his assent. “Let’s eat.”

The rest of the guests were certainly polite, a little flashy but civil. Adriana winked once at Marta from across the room and rolled her eyes ever so slightly. Marta realized Adriana was in need and sidled her way across the room to the rescue, only to be headed off by her sister-in-law.

“Marta, I’ve hardly had the chance to talk with you.”

“Oh Maria Rosa, I understand. You have a party and should talk to everyone. Please don’t worry about me. I am family. Is there anything . . .”

Marta had no time to finish her offer to help when Maria Rosa gave Marta a list of things to do, the last of which was to turn the lights on outside and open the doors so the guests could go into the garden at ten minutes to twelve.

        “Okay everybody, it’s time to light the bonfire.” Maria Rosa appeared in the smoky living room in a silver fox bolero and gloves, a silk scarf tied around her head with a chic knot. The guests eventually made it to the backyard after the gay confusion of getting their coats from Franco, who was bringing the cloaks from the bedroom. Some of the guests were holding small shopping bags from the better boutiques in town.

TEN, NINE, EIGHT, SEVEN, SIX, FIVE, FOUR THREE, TWO, ONE!

       Bells and horns went off in the distance behind the sound of champagne bottles being popped to the New Year. General kissing ensued and the people who were eating twelve, grapes, one for each month of the year to come, wished for what they wanted each month in the New Year.

December 31, 1974

	Franco	Maria Rosa	Raffaele	Marta
January	A long weekend skiing	Two weeks in Cortina skiing	A new client	Finish knitting  her new cashmere sweater
February	A successful union contract negotiation	That Pomellato carnelian pendant for Valentine’s day	A discount on the new orders	No snow in town. Mild weather
March	A new motor for his boat	Three weeks in Cortina	Two new clients	The crocus bulbs to come up before her neighbours’.
April	A long weekend sailing	An invitation from the Countess to visit her in Tuscany over the Easter holidays	Enough money to pay off the line of credit	The azaleas in bloom
May	Two long weekends sailing	Enough sun to get a good base tan	A new line of credit	A long weekend in Capri with Franco
June	A week in Sardinia sailing	A week in Sardinia without her husband	Maria Rosa in Sardinia for a week	High marks for Dario’s high school board exams
July	Dario pass his high school boards	Mario pass his school boards	Mario pass his high school boards	Dario pass his high school boards
August	Three weeks sailing in the Aegean	A month in Sardinia, at a really good hotel	Enough money to pay for the month in Sardinia	Three weeks sailing in the Aegean with her husband, alone
September	A new client or two	A long weekend in Milan to shop for her new wardrobe	Rental of a little apartment at Lido Adriano	Dario moves out to go to the University
October	A long weekend hunting	A rubber and gold bracelet for her birthday	The Hungarian  girl to arrive	Sunny days while getting the garden ready for winter
November	Three long weekends hunting	A long weekend in Milan - alone	Maria Rosa and the children leave for the long weekend of the Dead.	A case of Beaujolais nouveau
December	Not to have to come back to another party like this.	Sables	A Cartier Tank watch	Christmas at home in Verona without her brother

          Raffaele bent over to light the bottom of the bonfire. Maria Rosa got her guests’ attention.

          “I’d like to revive an old custom tonight. As you all know, the farmers used to build bonfires to ward off the evil spirits from the previous year, and to dispel those evil spirits absolutely, they would throw something from the past year into the fire to make it burn all the brighter. The greater the value, the better an omen it was for the year to come.”
     With a dramatic flourish, Maria Rosa gracefully slipped the scarf from her head and flung it into the flames, her earrings dangling brightly before the fire. Marta quickly turned to Franco and whispered:

“That’s the Hermes scarf she asked us to give her for Christmas.”

The gossamer silken veil was born skyward by the fire and ignited brilliantly across the nighttime sky.

“Well honey, we know what to give her next year. Don’t worry.”

Raffaele made his way over to Franco.

“And what are you going to get rid of?”

“Oh Raffaele, I completely forgot, and anyway, I have no real regrets over 1975. So . . . “

“Oh come on Franco don’t, you have to throw something in? How about this ratty old handkerchief in your coat pocket?”

With a boyishly quick flip of his hand, Raffaele snatched the handkerchief from Franco’s pocket and flung it into the flames. Once again the silk was buoyed high into the air and burned like a saint being consumed by fire as he was lifted from martyrdom to heaven.

“Raffaele, you really shouldn’t have done that. That was a present . . .”

“Oh Franco, where’s your party spirit? Come Marta, you must throw something in as well.”

Marta reached into her pocketbook before Raffaele could get near her, grabbed a bundle, and threw it into the flames.

“There, are you happy? Now I have gotten rid of something that I really didn’t like and don’t want anymore. Now it’s your turn.”

        But Raffaele had disappeared into the crowd. Adriana came up to Marta: “I’m getting a terrible headache. Do you have any aspirin?”

“No, but follow me. I know where to find some. Come on.”

They made their way back into the house into the master bedroom, which was equipped with two bathrooms, one for Maria Rosa and one for Raffaele. The door to Maria Rosa’s was open and Marta opened the cabinets to get an aspirin.

“Here you are Adriana, that should . . .”

Suddenly Maria Rosa appeared. “What are you doing in my bathroom?”

“I was just getting Adriana ....”

“I don’t care. Who do you think you are? The Mistress of the House?” Maria Rosa exclaimed with an acid sneer.

At this point, Franco appeared. He had heard everything.

“Now Maria Rosa, everything is under control, I’m sure Marta wouldn’t . . .”

“Wouldn’t what?”

“Wouldn’t want to create an unpleasant scene in front of your guests. Adriana, it was such a pleasure to meet you. Maria Rosa, thank you for the lovely party. Do tell Raffaele we had to leave and didn’t want to disturb him and your other guests. Marta, shall we go?”

Marta handed Adriana the blister pack of aspirin and they left quietly. They got in the car and drove back to Marta’s mother’s home. They were too hurt and upset even to speak about their New Year’s Eve. They went to bed, got up the next morning, breakfasted with Marta’s mother and left for Verona by nine o’clock.

       After they had passed the Castel Bolognese tollbooth, Marta turned to look at the countryside iced around its yellow farm buildings.

“Well Franco, what do you suggest we give Maria Rosa the next time a present is expected? I’m certainly not spending fifty thousand lire for a silk scarf she wears one night and throws into the fire. I’ll never have that much money.”

“Marta, now, we must be perfect ladies and gentlemen. We shall write Maria Rosa a note explaining that we have decided not to give material gifts anymore, but we will be delighted to make an anonymous donation to her favourite charity.”

“She never answers our letters, you know that.”

“In that case, we shall make no donation. Anyway, what was it you threw into the bonfire? I was so irked Raffaele snatched that handkerchief Aunt Susanna gave me out of my pocket. I certainly didn’t want to burn it as a bad omen or a good one.”

“Oh, there’s something that we shall be rid of forever, I hope.”

“Well, what was it?”

“The keys to Raffaele’s house. After they got married I used to water their plants when they travelled and they just told me to hold on to the keys. It was more convenient for them.”

“You mean we’re free?”

“Oh, yes. I know Raffaele is my brother, but after last night, well, what the eye does not see the heart doesn't grieve over. If we see them at weddings and funerals that should certainly be more than enough.”

And they all lived happily ever after.