The harder she squeezed, the more she loved you.  That is what we told ourselves.  Well, that is what I told myself to soothe my aching cheek.  Known as Gang Gang because my oldest sister, Susan, the oldest grandchild, couldn’t say grandma.  My cousins the Peakes called her Wawwy and the my other cousins, the other Finamores, called her Granny.  I never liked that.  She was only 59 when she died.  Too young to be called Granny.  I prefer Gang Gang.

I stood at the bottom step with my six sisters lined up the stairs in order by age.  We’d see that 1969 white Chevrolet Impala with a black vinyl top and a plastic orange flower taped to the antenna coming down Grayson Road.  What excitement that Gang Gang and Pop Pop were visiting.  I was in my green velvet suit and it wasn’t even Christmas, Easter, or a Feast Day.  The sauce and lasagna were ready. Meatballs made. Salad chilling in the refrigerator.  We were ready to act as if our Dad, their son, lived with us. It was Sunday, his day to visit us. But first we had to endure the squeezing of our cheeks.  The pain was somehow enjoyable. I was either a masochist or a sadist.  I didn’t know the difference then.  I still don’t know, but I know that I don’t like to cause pain.  I don’t like receive to pain either, but if given the choice between giving or receiving, I think I’d prefer to receive pain.

In any event, at six, I didn’t have a choice. I was the receiver. The door opened and we all screamed and yelled hello to Gang Gang, always the dominant figure among the two, despite the hugeness of Pop Pop.  A result of too much pasta and probably too much alcohol.  We loved them both, but Gang Gang’s personality made her stand out.  She stood out like a cherry flavored lolipop.  I love cherry flavored anything.  One time Peter, my partner of fifteen years, and I ate cherry pie every night for six weeks while our kitchen was being renovated. 

But on that Sunday morning, just after 10:30 am Mass at Our Lady of Angels at 1 Mary’s Way, after having lived through an unintelligible homily by Fr. Welch, we were finally ready in the receiving line for Gang Gang.  First there was her warm, wet kiss.  Being the first, there was a trace of her bright red lipstick that was in sharp contrast to her jet black Italian hair.  I loved her face, her hair, her roundish body, and brash mannerisms.  Sometimes I can’t wait to die, believing that there must be an afterlife, because I want to see her again.  I want to have a conversation with her.  I want to ask her so many questions, like why she seemed to favor her oldest son, my uncle John.  But I also want to ask her where she got the recipe for President Kennedy’s Seafood Casserole.  A few years ago, I found her old recipe book and recreated a booklet of my favorite ones for my family members, including that casserole.  

But there on that bottom step, after the kiss, I knew to expect her thumb and forefinger.  They would squeeze my cheek until it hurt, until I couldn’t feel it any longer.  I loved that pain.  I loved her more than I knew.  

I wasn’t allowed to go to her funeral because I was too young.  It was that same year that I remember standing on the steps.  She died suddenly in Rome.  Her dream was to go back to Italy, her homeland that she’d never seen as a second generation immigrant.  She wanted to go there and then onto Lourdes to finally be cured of the cancer that ate through her ovaries.  But she never made it.  She died a  day after my birthday.  Her limbs turned black and in two days she was dead.  Maybe a bad blood transfusion to make her feel good for her transatlantic flight or maybe a return of the cancer.  It didn’t matter any longer because she was gone.

No more squeezing, but after the initial shock and sadness and largeness of her absence, we went on.  We went on, loving our Pop Pop who became bigger in our minds and in his girth.  God I loved him.  And Gang Gang became a mythical figure with images of her forever woven into the folklore of our large Italian clan.  Taken too soon, but somehow always in our hearts and in our stories.

When she cooked she moved about her tiny kitchen of apartment 109 on Manchester Avenue as if she was the only one in it.  I was in between her and the aluminum foil in the third drawer. She reached and opened the door, pushing me out of the way, but not on purpose, but merely because I was there. It was her kitchen and she was in a hurry.  She needed the foil.  The next time, I’d move.  I’d get out of her way, but I wouldn’t leave that tiny kitchen where I could get all sorts of morsels of food and taste the pasta before it was done.  No, like most everyone, I wanted to be with her.  Near her.  In her way, even if it meant pain.  The pain of be squeezed harder than I thought possible.  The pain of being pushed aside.  It was all worth it.  Gang Gang exuded love, compassion, and caring for us, her grandchildren.  

Now she resides forever on Georgia Avenue in Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Silver Spring, Maryland.  Not Silver Springs, no there was just one spring.  And Gate of Heaven.  Only the gate.  I hope that she got in further than the gate.  If she didn’t then there’s no hope for any of us.  If there is no heaven, then I’ll never see her again and my six-year old memories of her will have to suffice.  For the time being, they do suffice.  I feel close to her, connected in some way that is impossible to explain. Like somehow she lives on in me.  Not only in my memories of her but in what I do.

I squeeze my son’s cheeks and he runs.  The dogs are more tolerant.  I love them all and I squeeze their cheeks with regularity.  My mother-in-law has the world’s best cheeks for squeezing.  I’d love to grab them and just squeeze all of the blood right out of them.  It would feel so good to do it.  Maybe I like giving pain more than I want to admit.  But the site of those bulbous mounds of flesh high on her protruding cheekbones are so tempting.  I wish I could muster up the guts to make that squeeze, but instead I try to put my son up to the task.  He loves her, although I’m sure that she wouldn’t love him if he actually squeezed her cheeks.  What else can I say, but her cheeks tempt me.

When does an action become one’s trademark?  The squeezing of cheeks was and somehow still is my Gang Gang’s and she has been dead since July 18, 1972.  The last picture was taken on July 15th  in St. Peter’s Square in front of a granite column.  That picture, now an 8 by 10 is on my dresser.  I look at it every day, sometimes many times a day.  She still stands out although her husband is there.  What is she saying to me?  What is she communicating with that smile, like the Mona Lisa?  I’ve had that picture in my bedroom for six years now and I still can’t tell. I want to ask her, but she just smiles.  Maybe she’s happy that I remember her squeezing, maybe she’s happy that President Kennedy’s Seafood Casserole lives on after her death, or maybe she’s just dead. Gone forever.  I don’t know, but I do know that I love her, not loved her, but presently love her for the excitement that she represented to me and the pain that somehow felt good and has stayed with me now into my forty-third year.