Adriana Trigiani - Very Valentine

Gram made her traditional wedding soup with spinach and mini meatballs made of veal, Tess brought her homemade manicotti, Mom roasted a loin of pork with sweet potatoes, and prepared a second entrée of breaded chicken cutlets with steamed asparagus. Jaclyn made the salad. I’m in charge of the starters, which feature the traditional seven fishes: smelts, shrimp, sardines, oysters, baccala, lobster, and scungilli.

“What did Clickety Click bring for dessert?” Tess asks after looking around and making sure Pamela is out of earshot.

“They went to DeRoberti’s,” I tell her. Pamela brought cookies, cannolis, and mini cheesecakes, but we don’t mind the store-boughts, because at least she goes to a great Italian bakery.

“It’s Christmas and I want peace in the valley,” Mom says firmly.

“Sorry, Mom,” Tess apologizes.

“Never mind you. Look at my chicken cutlets,” Mom says proudly as she arranges them on a platter. “I pound them until they are as thin as paper. Before I bread them, you can see right through them. Jaclyn, your salad looks delish.”

“It’s from my Nigella Lawson cookbook,” Jaclyn says. “I figure with the name Nigella, she’s got to have some Italian in her, right? We got her entire collection at our wedding.”

“Her entire collection? Is that all?” Gram asks as she joins us in the kitchen. “When I got married, there was only one cookbook given to brides.”

“And now I have it. Ada Boni’s The Talisman .” Mom garnishes the cutlets with spikes of fresh parsley.

“It’s the best. Whenever I make Charlie meatballs, recipe number two, out of that book, he’ll do whatever I want. I made them last month and he retiled the half bath.”

“Well, at least you know what motivates him,” I tell Tess.

“You know, I try to do what Ma did when we were growing up. A fresh, home-cooked meal every night and dinner with the family. Not easy to pull off these days.”

“Thank you for acknowledging my contribution. I hoped my children would appreciate the little things I did and the big meals I prepared. I think Saint Teresa of the Little Flower said it best, ‘Do small things in a big way,’ or was it ‘Do big things in a small way’? I can’t remember. Doesn’t matter. I worked hard all of my life”-Mom lifts the steamer full of asparagus off the stove, removes the lid, and lifts the asparagus out with tongs-“inside my home. I don’t like the delineation of career in the office versus homemaking. Work is work. And I worked for my family, to the exclusion of my own goals. You four children were my job. My performance evaluation came when each of you graduated from college and fled the nest able to take care of yourself. I gave up my own life, but I’m not complaining. It’s just the way it was. And by the way, it was fabulous!” Mom places the platter on the table.

When we were growing up, my friends would tell me that their moms would threaten them into behaving by saying things like, “I hope your children ruin your life the way you’ve ruined mine!” or “If you don’t shape up, I’ll kill myself and then what will you do, you little bastards!” or “This time next year I’ll be dead, so you can go ahead and have your pot parties!” Mom never said anything of the like to us. She would never threaten suicide because she’s a genuine life junkie.

No, when Mom really wanted to scare us, she’d say, “That’s it! I’ve had it! I’ll go out and get a job ! You heard me! A job! Then you’ll see what it’s like with no mother around here to wait on you hand and foot!” Or the big jab delivered loud and singsongy, “I’m going back to work!” Never mind that my mother never had a job outside our home. She graduated from Pace with a teaching degree and never used it. “When would I have gone back into the classroom?” she used to say. “When?” As if the classroom were this mythical place that swallowed women with teaching certificates whole in the land that time forgot.

The truth is, my mother had other plans. She was busy building Roncalli Incorporated. She had Alfred ten months after she married Dad. Then Tess was born, followed by me, and finally Jaclyn, and we became her high-powered career. Lee Iacocca had nothing on my mother. Motherhood was her IBM, her Chrysler, and her Nabisco. She was the CEO of our family. She woke early every morning, “put on her face,” and dressed like she was going into an office. Mom made lists, organized six lives on a giant eraser-board calendar, got us to and from wherever we needed to be, and never complained, well, not much. One year for Christmas, we made up business cards for her that said:

MICHELINA “MIKE” RONCALLI

Mother Extraordinaire

Available 24/7

Forest Hills, Queens, New York, USA

She was so proud of those cards she handed them out to strangers, like she was running for borough president. She could’ve handled that job, too, believe me. Mom is a born leader, a taskmaster and a visionary. She also toots her own horn, which doesn’t hurt in politics.

“How are the boys doing on the roof?” Gram brings the soup bowls to the counter.

“I’ll check.” I head up the stairs to the roof.

“And call the kids please,” Mom calls after me. “We’re ready.”

I climb the stairs two at a time to the third floor. I do a quick check of the bedrooms. I stop and check the clock in Gram’s room. Where is Roman? He said he’d be here fifteen minutes ago. Now I’m worried Tess and Jaclyn are beginning to think he’s a phantom. I put it out of my mind; he’ll be here.

The kids are scattered everywhere, playing dress up and hide-and-seek, or maybe Charisma is calling Japan like she did the last time she was here (twenty-three bucks on the long-distance bill). Whatever they’re up to, no one appears to be bleeding or crying so I breeze past them and go up to the roof.

The men are in charge of preparing a fire in the charcoal grill on the roof. After dinner, we bundle up in our coats and head to the roof to roast marshmallows. This was my grandfather’s Christmas chore, and it’s not lost on us that it takes Dad, Alfred, Charlie, and Tom to do what Grandpop did by himself.

I step out onto the roof and into the cold night air to check the grill. The charcoals are still black, their edges turning deep red. In an hour, they’ll be just the right temperature for the marshmallow roast. A swirl of gray smoke rises from the fire as Alfred holds court in his Barneys topcoat.

My brother points to buildings on the West Side Highway. He’s conducting what sounds like a tutorial on real estate, with Pamela at his side shivering in a fur capelet. Charlie, Tom, and my father listen carefully, rapt at his knowledge. He points to a building on the corner of Christopher Street. He rattles off the asking price, followed by the recent sale price, like he’s reciting the names of his children. I stand in the cold long enough to hear him drop some big numbers.

“Dinner is ready,” I interrupt.

“Do you need any help down in the kitchen?” Pamela asks.

“We’re okay.” I smile at her. “Could you help corral the kids?”

“Sure.” She follows me down the stairs. I almost ran to the Home Depot on Twenty-third Street and bought those rubber step guards because I knew Pamela was coming and I was afraid she’d take a tumble off those five-inch stilettos and somersault down three flights of stairs, winding up in the workshop in a bloody heap.

“I like your dress, Pamela,” I tell her, genuinely admiring her red silk-shantung shift with a matching bolero and red ankle-strap sandals. “You look as young as you did the day you met my brother.”

She blushes. “Your brother told me that change was nonnegotiable.”