Tag Archives: Baltimore

The Song Resumes

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Posted by on in distraction issues, impediments, Social

June 26, 2018, Spring Hill-

This post comes to you, via my new laptop.  I will miss the old warhorse, which may be in the hands of the Montreal Police by now.  In any case, my important files are secure, and the new puppy is going to fill the Lenovo’s shoes.

I will resume my photo posts, tomorrow morning, with an account going all the way back to Elkhart, IN and June 6, which would have been my 36th wedding anniversary.

Tonight was devoted to catching up on the ton of e-mails and business matters that have only been handled sporadically, via cell phone, since I left Baltimore, eight days ago.  I’ve also had a good rest here, at the southern Home Base, which as I’ve mentioned before, is the third point on the triangle.

It’s also a joy to read my friends’ posts more readily again.  I won’t be such a stranger as I’ve been since June 9.

 

Antonio’s Comeuppance

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Posted by on in Fiction

April 28, 2018, Prescott-

So, we got Santino to the hospital, in plenty of time and being a Castaldo, and a made man, to boot, Sonny got the best treatment.  Papa wasn’t too thrilled at seeing his prime button man have the drop done on him-especially by a “dope”, like Tony Ribeiro.  “He’s from the &*!#$ Azores, for the love of Christ!”, my sainted father shouted, “All those people know is netting mackerel”.

Sonny was thus taken down a notch, but at least there was no kiss planted on his cheek, or other made man positioned behind him, in the staff car.  Tony, on the other hand, received an unannounced visit from important personages in our extended family.  He cordially greeted the capos and offered them rich, dark coffee and some Azorean pastries, as was his wont.  The men took the offered refreshments and warily plotted their gift of a comeuppance to their brother-in-arms’ assailant.

Unfortunately for those plans, it took the Lunesta about two minutes to kick in.  Tony carefully dragged the men out of his shop and closed early.  He was in Armonk, NY, when the news came over the radio, of an unfortunate blaze in Baltimore’s Flower Mart.  “Ah, well, it’s to be expected. Alfredo Castaldo doesn’t have much of a sense of humour”, Mr. Ribeiro mused, as he pointed his car towards Connecticut, took out his travel bag and set the car alight.

Neither he, nor his cousin Marco, who picked him up, noticed the boys and me following, as the getaway car headed north towards Albany.

 

Mr. Ribeiro

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Posted by on in Fiction

April 16, 2018, Prescott-

The cicadas started early this year.  Spring Break is usually not a time for such serenades.  Truth be known, my Nonna wishes there were never such a festival della canzone. It keeps her awake, tossing and thrashing- so she puts on a CD of the late Pope John XXIII, talking about the saints.  That of course, sets her to crying, and brings Mama, ever ready to console, into her bedroom.  In short order, the rest of us are up and making plans to start the day.  It is 3 A.M.  Not even the bakers are awake, in Little Italy, at this hour.

Baltimore is ready for action, though, at any time that one chooses to get going.  Papa gets showered and dressed- and expects us boys to follow suit.  “I got some deliveries we can handle, Gennaro.  Santino, you go over to the Flower Mart, and drop off the bags of mulch.  Ribeiro ought to already be there.  He has nothing else to do, after all.”

Antonio Ribeiro had come to the Flower Mart from New Bedford, where he had been the odd duck in his south side neighbourhood, preferring to cultivate flowers, rather than run numbers, or crack cocaine for the Shower Posse, who were ubiquitous in southern New England, in the early ’80’s.  His boys protected “Simple Tony”, and besides, the girls were all over him- and would have not taken well to the Jamaicans mistreating him.

He’d been a fixture in Baltimore for ten years now.  Antonio lived in a small room, in the back of his Flower Mart stall.  “It saves capital”, he told his clients.  He needed no car, did not have any prevailing vices and slept on a woven mat.  His meals were obtained by barter- his flowers, gratis, to local restaurateurs, in exchange for small meals:  Simple Tony, simple diet.

My brother pulls into the Flower Mart, right around 4 A.M.  Mr. Ribeiro is up and at ’em, with the rows of pots and vases 2/3 full- ahead of the 5 o’clock opening.  “Buon giorno, young Castaldo”, he chirps at Sonny.  “Back at ya, signor”, brother responds, while plopping the sacks of mulch on their customary pallets, “Pop says it’ll be two and  a quarter.”

“Tell your father I’ll need to settle with him on the First, Santino.  Things are a bit tight, this third week of August.”  Sonny massages his chin, turning a flinty eye towards the flower vendor.  “Okay, Mr. Ribeiro, that’s what my Papa figured you’d say.  Guess there’s no mulch until September 1.”  Santino, my hulking brother, alley-oops the mulch back into his truck.

He doesn’t feel the cudgel that knocks him cold.  My hulking brother is found, unconscious, in the cab of his otherwise empty truck, at 7 A.M., at Pier 26, in the Inner Harbor.

Simple Tony Ribeiro is not quite so simple.

The Road to 65, Mile 151: Smoke and Fire

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Posted by on in Social

April 28, 2015, Phoenix-  I’ve been in Baltimore three times.  The second, and longest, stay in the city was a week, in 1972.  I got off a bus in East Baltimore, and walked about ten blocks, through an old and visibly proud African-American neighbourhood.  There were hints of a place going to seed, but more common were the well-kept yards and people greeting one another in friendship, as I’ve found in lots of places.   At no time did I feel unsafe.

Similarly,I have driven through south Chicago,  south central Los Angeles,the Bronx and Harlem, and walked all over Washington, DC, and not felt at risk.  The thing to remember is:  “Black on Black” violence is far more frequent than “interacial” crime.  I have never been struck, or held at gunpoint, by a person of African descent. There are many, I know, who have had very different experiences, and my sorrow for your losses.

The violence in Baltimore, yesterday and today, will end up hurting Black people more than any other group.  This has been the experience of countless other people, in too many other cities, large and small, across the United States, in the United Kingdom, France and South Africa.  The poor end up poorer.

There is a dynamic at work, at the opposite end of the social scale:  Pursue the well-being of society, only to the extent that it doesn’t upend the current economic system.  Thus, we have calls for “soul-searching”, each time a riot breaks out, or a high-profile person is killed.  What is needed, and sorely, instead, is soul-action.

One can best effect change locally.  I grew up in what many would call a “white-bread” town.  There was still a lot of need there.  Lower-class whites were somewhat “privileged”, but they were still regarded as lower-class. I tried my best to call attention, as a teenager, to issues like economic disparity and civil rights, seeing them as closely-tied.  I was ridiculed for this, but I noticed that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X were saying the same things.  The Irish kids who cheered their assassinations were biting the hands that were outstretched to them.  The Italian and Polish kids who groused about Affirmative Action, seeing it as permanent, and a privilege system all its own, were way off the mark.

My conclusion was that, unless and until people saw how they were being manipulated to separate themselves from others, and did something to build a bond with people to whom they were more closely tied than they thought, there would be the same cycle of riot and rebellion, followed by oppression (by the same people who used divide and conquer), followed by a period of acquiescence, then more riot and rebellion.

Solutions?   The disenfranchised must vote.  Citizens attending, and speaking out at, public meetings is crucial.  Parents actually bringing up their kids is not subject to substitution. The politician must be held to viewing the title public servant as more than a sobriquet.

Further:  Women are the equal partners of men, and not just within the bounds of matrimony.  There is neither a favoured class, nor a protected class.  Political Correctness, the ultimate band-aid for society’s boils, deserves to be consigned to the refuse pile.  Human decency could ably take its place.  See someone who looks different from you walking in your direction?  Stay on the same path, and offer an appropriate greeting.  “How’re you doin?'” or “What’s happening?” are words I have heard from countless people, in cities all over the country.

These are simple thoughts, but the great innovators have brought change to society, not by quantum leaps, or fell swoops.  The changes have been systematic, and through persistence.  This has been true of everything from the automobile industry to the expansion of civil rights.  So it must be for the reconstruction of neighbourhoods:  Not through gentrification, not through creation of urban deserts, but “brick by brick, block by block” , designed by and for the benefit of those already living there, as well as artisans and entrepreneurs who are actually invited by the community, rather than by the real estate market.

Extinguish the fire and clear the smoke.