It takes a village

Dolores Hans
MSMU class of 2025

(10/2024) Beyond the aroma of Florentine pappa al pomodoro and the feel of the warmth radiating from the cobblestone streets, and magnificent flow of colorful buildings throughout the hills of Campobasso, there’s a maze-like old town containing the chill of the seaside breeze and the subtle strength of the Alberobello. This town was once a home for a young orphaned boy who had only his village and God to depend on. They called him LeProtto, Antonio LeProtto, meaning "wild rabbit". No one knew his family, no one knew him, just that he was courageous. He would do small jobs for the people of Bari, in exchange for hospitality. They became his family. There was this one woman, he called her Nonni but she was of no blood relation to him, who would look after him when he was most in need. She had little to give him, as she had no one to provide for her either. But what she had she shared with him, and what he provided in return was someone to run her errands and listen to her stories.

He wasn’t the most talkative boy, and as he got older he spoke even less. However, his humor and courage always remained strong.

"Manga mio figlio, eat you supper", Nonni pleaded gently with Antonio.

"Ghimmone- I’m so full" he said, sliding down into his chair and onto the floor. "It been long day. Let me be".

He rose from the floor quite slowly, aching and moaning the whole way until he was on his feet, jokingly trying to get sympathy from the woman after rejecting more food. He stood, smirked, kissed her on the cheek and went out the door. "A presto", he said as he threw on his hat.

The next morning, as Nonni was hanging the kitchen towels to dry on the clothesline, she heard the rustling of papers somewhere behind her. She turned, saw nothing, and went back to her chores. A moment later, Antonio jumped out from behind a sheet and yelled in an attempt to frighten her. She jumped back, placed her hand on her chest, and nearly fell backwards. "LeProtto! Gocciadavé! Don’t you ever.." she began to lightly hit his arm repeatedly as she went into a verbally profane frenzie. Antonio just laughed, gave her a big hug, kissed her hand, and helped hang up more linens. She scoffed.

"You know something," she began to say in a soft spoken tone, "you are kind, and you are wild, and you work hard. But you are never going to get anywhere if you stay around here. You’ll be doing chores for the rest of your life. That’s no life." He stood there quietly, thinking about what life she could’ve been picturing for him. What she meant when she said "if you stay around here". Did she want him to go to another town?

"A younger like you should be thinking about you future. You need to make something of yourself, mio figlio." She held his face in her hands, examined him lovingly, then shoved his head downwards and scoffed once more.

A few months later, LeProtto was sitting just outside a market in town, hoping someone would offer him a job or a snack. Almost everyone there looked so thin, and even the produce looked like it hadn’t been properly nourished by the earth. People spoke to each other in grunts or gestures, or spoke just a few words. Even more people couldn’t read what the signs said. Poverty was never an experience left unlived by LeProtto, or much of Italy for that matter. As people walked by, he would think of their stories. He saw a man in a hat using a cane, and he wondered if he had a good job. He saw a woman and a child and it reminded him of the family he used to dream of. He closed his eyes and tried to picture a future for himself, but it was too difficult, all he could think of was his past. Here he was, a nineteen year old boy, consumed by his past, and stuck in a time where it feels impossible to escape the effects of natural disasters and poverty.

As he wandered back to the village, he waved hello to the people who took care of him the best, and thought about how he loved it there. Sure, it was tough and by anyone else’s standards it might have been a sad excuse for family and career, but for Antonio, it was all he knew, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to know better. Even if he somehow came out on top of the world one day, he knew that it would mean nothing if he wasn’t giving it back to Nonni and the village who raised him. They sacrificed so much to keep him going, and that seemed like a pretty good place to be.

"Antonio," he heard a soft voice from behind him, and felt a hand rest on his shoulder. "It’s a time to listen," said one of the men from the village, "we make a you an opportunity. You no been anywhere but Bari, you whole life". A woman approached him as well saying, "there’s more out in the world for you. Bring your skills and wits along. They will service you a good somewhere else". Antonio listened to what they were saying, but he didn’t understand. Nonni came through what was now a crowd of people, and put her hand in his. "It’s a time," she said with tears in her eyes, "America. Go." Antonio was even more confused now. He looked at her bewildered. "Whatta you mean, go? America, it a too much. I no money, no people over there, whatta you mean?"

"We sponsor you, whole village, we raise money, we get everything in place. You go, live well, use skill to make living. You better over there than here now," explained another man from the village, "don’t you see, best opportunity over there."

Antonio didn’t know what to think. He did hear about some people who went to America to live the same way but make more money and over time they would get more and more, and eventually come back to Italy to live better. Antonio wondered if the reason he couldn’t see a future for himself is because that future didn’t exist based off his current circumstances. He looked around at the village who had done so much for him. He thought that he could go to America, make a lot of money, then come back one day soon, and give the money away to the people. He got close to Nonni, put his arm around her, picked up a potato sack from the ground, and said "when I getta on thata boat, imma cry".