This is the recounting and the diary of my life - Marino Mattei

19.

Coreglia Antelminelli

Finally, Monte Cassino [see part 18] was overtaken and the Americans again began to advance. At this point, things slowly started to improve. Pietro's father, Lello, died and Libia [Marta's sister and Pietro's wife - part 18] wanted us to move into Lello's house because it was now vacant. Soon afterwards, Ilia - daughter of Zelanda, sister of Ida [Marta and Libia's mother] died, as did Ida's father, Cinto. Due to this, Ida received an inheritance from her father and Pietrino was given ownership of Cinto's land. As a result, Marta and I took on the job of maintaining this property [to clarify, the "property" here is terraced farmland].

This involved a great deal of work. From night to night we went to bed dead tired. The property inherited from Cinto was in bad condition and I had to build it up again from the beginning - replanting all the vines and 50 olive trees. As I said, it was a lot of work but it gave us little in the way of income. The war ended and I returned to my job at the Italian Metallurgical Society of Fornaci. At the same time Libia and her whole family moved to Coreglia. We wanted Ida to remain with us. Marta was alone and it would have been very helpful to have her mother there, at least to prepare the meals. However, Libia wanted her to be with them in Coreglia. Consequently, Marta remained by herself.

I worked in shifts [at the metallurgical factory] but the time I spent working at home was limited because in addition to the eight hours at the plant I had to walk two hours going there and two hours returning home. As such, the bulk of the [farm] work was done by hired hands. Unfortunately, finding workers to harvest hay and grain was difficult so [we did it ourselves] and I slept very few hours a day. I recall that once we had a lot of dried hay to bring inside and it looked like it was about to rain. We pleaded with everyone we knew to help us, offering to pay them, but no one came. My brother Dario would have come but my father didn't allow him because, out of spite, he preferred that our hay get drenched. I remember working through the night and, in a word, getting no sleep for 48 hours. Marta also had to do her part. When we finished we were completely exhausted. I recall it was around noon on a Sunday and Marta had a chicken cooking on the fire. Although we were dying of hunger we went to bed without eating and didn't get up until Monday morning.

   
Marino and Marta Mattei, circa mid to late 1940s

Soon after Libia and her family had gone to live in Coreglia, vacating their house in Gromignana, they insisted we move into their former residence which was how we once again came to live in the house of Marta's family. I continued to work at the metallurgical plant until the end of 1946 and then business slowed down and I was laid off. I had plenty to do at home but unfortunately, the land did not yield very much money and I had to find another job. At this same time, Pietrino, Bambi Elmenze, and Viviani started the Italpresepio and after about a year I started working there as a caster. I was in charge of casting the figures of shepherds. [The Italpresepio was a company that manufactured plaster figurines and statues such as the Madonna, Christ on the Cross and figures which comprise the Crèche. The company was located in Coreglia which came to be somewhat known for this type of work. See "Coreglia Figurines" at KnowItal.com.]

I had steady work throughout the first year but at the end of the season, that being by Christmas, the shop still held a large inventory of shepherd figurines. Consequently, my work declined considerably and I was again sent home for five or six months, after which I was called back. However, the factory was not doing well and it looked like it might be going out of business. The partners had to invest more money in order to save it. Unfortunately, Pietrino didn't have the funds and he asked us - me and Marta - to lend him 170,000 lire which was all we'd saved in the seven years we'd been married. This is a small sum of money today but in 1950 it was a considerable amount. As I said, the company appeared to be on the verge of bankruptcy and Pietrino put his share of the business in my name so that, if the shop failed, he would be untouched and I would have to suffer the consequences. I held my position as owner for a little while but when work started to pick up Pietrino once again transferred ownership into his name.

Despite this there still wasn't much business and I was once again laid off even after having given the company all our savings. Pietrino promised that if there was something to do he would call me but instead - due to his relationship with Nella - he called Ercole. [This is an obscure passage. I asked my mother for clarification and according to her, Pietrino was involved in some way with the woman named Nella and perhaps, to stay in her good graces, he gave work to Ercole, her husband. I cannot verify this.] Finally, work started to pick up and I was called back to my job.

   
Libia Mattei (Marta's sister) and her husband, Pietro Mattei

Soon afterwards, Pietrino had a heart attack and for a long time he lingered between life and death. Marta cared a great deal for him and when she heard of this she left everything in Gromignana in the hands of Bertolina [a woman hired to help with the farm work] who robbed us of anything she could away with. At this time Marta was pregnant with Maurizio and I believe that he too suffered from the consequences of the situation. Marta is not strong and she was highly distressed during this period. In fact, I remember Bambi [one of the partners in the Italpresepio mentioned above] came to visit me and told me to take her away because the baby she was carrying would, without a doubt, be affected by the condition she was in. [Another vague entry. I can only guess at the true details of my mother's "condition." However, I do know that my mother developed an illness during her pregnancy (possibly toxemia) and that - according to my parents and other family members - both my mother and I nearly died when she gave birth. Strangely, nothing of this is mentioned in my father's account.]

Ultimately, after a long time had passed, Pietrino began to feel better. He called Libia and Marta and told his wife of the money we had lent to him - the 170,000 lire - and that should he die she was to repay us immediately. Libia said she had purchased a new bedroom set and she could not give us back the money. As a result, we were never reimbursed.

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© 2009 by Maurice Mattei
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