Page 20 of Two Chances With You

“Plus, it’s convenient, it’s not too big, it must be about eight hundred fifty square feet, but it’s perfect for me, I’m almost always alone here anyway.”

He looks at me. He believes or he hopes that that “almost always” is going to lead somewhere. But it doesn’t. He smiles pointlessly and then continues. “I found this opportunity, and I went for it, but you know something? I’ve always thought that a third story wouldn’t suit me but instead, it’s better. It’s better…insulated. It’s nice and quiet.”

Too many adjectives are almost always a sign that you’re trying to justify a bad decision.

I’m reminded of something Sacha Guitry said: “There are people who talk, talk, and talk until, finally, they find something to say.”

“Sure, I couldn’t agree with you more.”

He smiles at me. “Well?”

I look at him, ill at ease. Well? Well, I love my father. So I make an effort. “You can’t imagine how happy I was in New York, super happy.”

“Were there people there? I mean, were there Italians?” he asks me.

“Sure, lots of them, but all of them very different from the kind of people I’m used to meeting here.”

“What do you mean, different?”

“Oh, I don’t know. More intelligent, more self-aware. They all spout less bullshit. They circulate, they talk freely, they talk about themselves—”

“What do you mean, they talk about themselves?”

If only we were sitting down to dinner. After a good dinner, one can forgive anybody, even one’s own relations. Who said that? I heard it in high school, and it made me laugh. Maybe it was Oscar Wilde. I don’t think I know how to answer him. But I give it a try. “That they don’t hide themselves. They face up to their lives. And then they admit that they’re struggling. It’s no accident that nearly all of them see a psychoanalyst.”

He looks at me, suddenly worried. “Wait, why, have you gone to one?”

My father, always the wrong question at the right time.

I reassure him. “No, Papà, I haven’t gone.” I feel like adding, “But maybe I should have. Maybe that American psychoanalyst would have understood my Italian problems.” Or maybe not. I’d like to tell him that, but instead I drop it.

I try to simplify. “I’m not American. And we Italians are too proud to ever admit we need help from anyone else.”

He remains silent. He’s worried, and I’m sorry to see it. So I try to help him out, to keep him from feeling that he’s at fault in any way. “And after all, why would I do it, why throw perfectly good money away? Going to see a psychoanalyst and not even understanding what he says to you in English. Do that and you seriously do have something wrong with your head!”

He laughs.

“I preferred to spend my money on language lessons. I was wasting the money, but at least I didn’t hope I would feel any better!”

He laughs again. But it seems forced to me. Who knows what he’d actually rather hear me say.

“Anyway, sometimes we’re not really capable of even telling ourselves what our problems are.”

He turns serious. “That’s certainly true.”

“It’s the same reason that I’ve read that there are fewer and fewer people going to confession in church.”

“Right…” He’s not convinced. “But where did you read that?”

Just as I suspected. “I don’t remember.”

“All right, let’s get back to us,” my father says.

Why, where did we leave us? What a thing to say. I’m starting to get pissed off.

“Did Paolo tell you anything?” my father asks.

“About what?” Lying to my father. I’m part of that article about going to confession. I don’t go to church. Not anymore. “No, he didn’t tell me a thing.”

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