Stream of Consciousness

What do you do when you hear that a heinous thing has happened in your family? Your first initial reaction is utter shock that it is even real. Once the shock starts to wear off the anger begins. I am in the anger stage of my grieving process. I sit and stew on the events that transpired and ask myself why in world this is happening. The more I stew the more anger that is built up inside of me. I want to love and support my grieving family. I know that this anger is only temporary and the energy is better spent positively than negatively. What do you do though? I tried to going to the canal by my house, happens to be the most rural area that I have access to as a city dweller, listening to good fight music and physically exerting myself by shaving time off of my 10K pace. This works for small moments, but still the thought lingers that I will never have the Italian Gardeners Picnic, or a Monday night IAC dinner, or an Easter Sunday in Sutter Creek with my cousin.
Easter Sunday is an important family get together for the Pinasco’s. When I say family get together, there are upwards of 150 family members that attend, and they are all family in some way or another. We used to go and hike down to whatever creek it was, at the old spot for you family members reading this, and skip rocks in the creek. We might have done a little more than skip rocks, mischief follows young curious boys, but Joey was one of the little guys, along with my brothers, that were members of the group of little tag-a-longs. This of course was more of a pain in the rear for us much more mature and older folk than it was a blessing, so we thought. The little guys there cramped our style, if you know what I mean. They were ever there though.
Annual Gardener’s dinners at the Growers Hall, summers in Santa Cruz. As we grew older the band of 14 some odd cousins, I guess I could name them off to get a count, but I won’t bore you with names. 14 some odd is going to be the number. So, with 14 some odd cousins that continue to grow older in a tight nit family, we became more like brothers and sisters than merely cousins. Joey had fast worked his way into the brotherhood of the older group. The younger Pinasco’s had worked from the kiddy table and were boldly taking seats at the adults table. This could be because the kiddy table was being inhabited by another generation of Pinasco’s, Bulleri’s, Barth’s, Barro’s, and Bristow’s midgets, or that the youngsters of old were now full fledged peers.
Here lately, Joey began coming to the monthly Italian functions with our group. These are the times that I will choose to remember him by. Lively, witty, loyal, respectful. Deep conversations regarding our dreams and aspirations with the family business. Passion driven opinions on how good or bad the food was. Cramming three people, completely legal might I add, in my Toyota Tacoma extended cab and making the trip to Cherryland from Willow St. Talking about the love and respect that our family has for one another and appreciating the discipline that was taught to us by our fathers. He had an uncanny ability to entertain. The elders of the club always inquired about when he would officially join the club.
You know Joey, you are going to be missed by this family. Your name will always be gold in our eyes. Your exit from this life just means that the big guy has some pertinent business that could only be taken care of by you. Take care of business man, we will hold it down, down here.