We Came From Somewhere

What do Bugs Bunny, a book of Italian love poems, and a burned diploma have in common? Me. And Papaco.

In this episode, I trace a line from my grandfather’s one-armed resilience to my own battle with shame, dyslexia, and teachers who said, “college isn’t for you.” From Calabria’s poverty to the Welland Canal’s brutal cost, from war-time fear to artistic fire, I unravel a legacy forged through poetry, grit, and stubborn refusal.

It starts with a Saturday cartoon. It ends with a quiet declaration: “We came from somewhere.”

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Chapters

• 0:00 Saturday Morning Cartoons & Aliens
• 3:50 My Grandfather Giuseppe's Legacy
• 8:10 An Artist's Studio as a Portal
• 12:00 Giuseppe's Book of Poetry
• 14:24 Immigrant Labor on Welland Canal
• 17:05 Enemy Aliens During WWII
• 19:22 Not For You: Defying Limitations
• 23:26 Honoring Ancestors Like Romans Did

Transcript

Saturday morning cartoons—pure, unfiltered joy. There I was, parked inches from the screen, soaking in zany antics from Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, or Road Runner as he dodged yet another anvil. Life was simple. Hilarious. Safe.

And then—boom. A sudden shift. The screen flickered, and a deep, serious voice cut through the fun like a thunderclap:

"All non-citizen residents must register with the government."

I didn’t know what a non-citizen resident was. But I did hear the word alien. And if aliens didn’t register? Well… it was bad.

Six-year-old me froze. Aliens? Like the ones in flying saucers? Or… was he talking about my grandparents?

They were from Calabria,from a little village called Mangone, near Cosenza in Southern Italy. My parents, my aunts and uncles had all come to the U.S. from there. They became citizens and a few of them, like my parents spoke flawless English. But my grandparents? They barely spoke English at all.

And in my six-year-old logic, that meant one thing: they must be the aliens.

My stomach turned. Would that man take them away?

One minute, I was giggling at Wile E. Coyote getting flattened by a boulder. The next, I was staring at the TV, heart pounding, convinced my grandparents were about to be snatched off the face of the Earth.

That voice—cold, official, and full of something I couldn’t name—stuck with me. Even now, all these years later, whenever I hear the Looney Tunes theme, a part of me braces for that ominous voice to follow. 

BUT Let me start from the beginning.

I grew up in a world of thick accents, louder-than-necessary conversations, and the smell of simmering tomato sauce that could make you weep. The old ways were alive and well, right alongside the new—sometimes clashing, sometimes blending, always shaping the way we lived. 

Some made it here with nothing but luck and grit, while others paid a heavy price for their passage into this so-called land of opportunity. And that brings me to my grandfather, Giuseppe Benincasa—affectionately known as Papaco.

His charred book of poetry, its black-edged pages and taped cover, is always within reach—so he is never far from me. Like his life, it stands as a constant reminder: the match could not consume the book, just as his will refused to surrender to the loss of his left arm.

Me Today

I am an artist with a studio. A studio for an artist is more than just a room—it’s a sanctuary, a workshop, a playground, a battlefield, and sometimes a confessional. It’s a space where ideas come to life, where failures pile up and breakthroughs happen, where time stretches and disappears.

A studio can be anywhere, a cubby hole in a house, a kitchen table, or a basement corner.  Wherever you make art is your studio. 

For me, my studio is also a portal—a place where I connected and communed with my grandparents. Surrounded by old photographs, letters, official residency documents, military records, birth and death certificates, and passenger manifests, I don’t just see paper and ink. I see the echoes of their lives—the risks they took, the sacrifices they made, the weight of history carried in the creases of a faded document.

In this space, I don’t just create—I channel. I step into their world, into who they were, and bring them forward into mine.

Beyond Records- What An Artist Sees

I look at my grandfather’s life, and there’s still so much I don’t know. Sure, I’ve done the genealogy research—tried to trace his steps,  but records don’t tell you who a person was. 

They don’t capture the weight of their laughter, the set of their shoulders after a hard day, or the things they never said out loud.

As an artist, I had to find my own way to know him, so I painted him. I painted my grandmother too. I told their stories through brushstrokes, color, artifacts on wood panels. 

My doing this is based on the simple fact that I am hardwired differently. 

I am dyslexic, so reading is at times a chore -those pesky letters sometimes reverse themselves. They cannot be trusted. So learning for me is multifaceted to tactile, audial, kinetic- the whole combo plate of the senses!

I have to physically engage in the making to know what I know. For his painting, I copied and used the pages from his beloved book of love poems as the background with artifacts about his life. No way in hell could I do a flat portrait! It had to be 3 Dimensional- it had to breathe, had to feel like him.  

For my grandmother, Mamaco, I wove her world into the piece—a doily she crocheted, with needles, black-bead rosary, her naturalization papers and the birth and death records of her first-born son. Her history wasn’t just a backdrop; it was the foundation of her portrait.

You have to understand, this mysterious alchemy of a documented surface, personal artifacts, and painted likeness fuse together, igniting something beyond the artwork—a presence, a pulse. It’s not just paint; it’s a dimensional life force. A glimpse of their spirit—alive and vibrant. 

These paintings couldn’t just sit on my studio wall. They needed to live with us.To be in the house where we could see them—and, in a way, where they could see us.

Because these portraits? They’re not just images. They’re potent entities that honor and reflect their life force.

A Whole Lot of Unknowns

As I carefully turn the fragile pages of his book, Postuma: Canzoniere, I ask him, "Which ones are your favorites?"
The pages don’t answer, but they hold something sacred—something that mattered enough for him to keep them close for a lifetime.

With AI, I translate the poems, marveling at their beauty, nuance, and depth. Each verse unveils a world—love, intimacy, artistic passion, existential doubt, and the relentless weight of poverty. 

These are not simple poems. They demand thought, they demand feeling. And so, I ask: Who are you, Giuseppe?

It is a compelling question, asked against the brutal backdrop of Calabria’s grinding poverty. Sure, the Casati Law of 1859 made education compulsory in Italy, but hardly enforcement, especially in the south—especially in Calabria. By the time Giuseppe was born in 1882, the numbers tell a grim truth:

• Over 70% of men in Calabria were illiterate.
• 84% of women could not read or write.
• Schools were few, poorly funded, and mostly attended by the privileged—nobles, landowners, professionals.
• Children of peasants and artisans were often left out, their days claimed by labor, not learning.

So Where Did He Learn?

If Giuseppe was never meant to be literate, then who defied that fate?
 Who taught him to read? A priest, or a rare teacher willing to go beyond his duty? Or did he teach himself—piecing together meaning from scraps of words, hungry for something beyond survival?

And then there’s the book itself. Where did he find it? When did it come into his hands?
 Did he buy it? Was it given to him? Did he rescue it from a forgotten corner, seeing its worth when others saw none?

What Kind of Mind

What kind of mind does it take to escape the expectations of your time? To be told: “You don’t need this. Reading is not for you.”
 And yet, to persist. To not just learn, but to love words enough to carry a book of poetry through a lifetime.

This book—it is more than a possession. It is a statement, a rebellion, a testament to an intellect that refused to be small.
 So I keep asking: Who are you, Giuseppe? And what else did you know that the world never thought to ask?

A Better Life

If you really want to know him, there’s more I need to tell you. In 1906 he married Gaetana Mauro and a few months later, he and his brother Antonio sailed to New York, heading to Ontario. 

Ontario had jobs, and the Welland Canal needed building. Immigrants, especially Italians, lined up for work—only to find out the most dangerous jobs were left to them: setting explosives, mining, hauling unstable loads. 

If one worker went down, there were plenty others to take his place. No one asked their names. A Globe and Mail report put it bluntly: “The foreigners are known on the works only by a number… when they died, many were lost forever.”

From 1913 to 1935, 4,000 laborers worked on the fourth Welland Canal. 137 men died. Many more were maimed. 

For Giuseppe, this brutal reality became personal—he lost his left arm there, a stark reminder of how immigrant labor built Canada at an unbearable cost.

After many back-and-forth trips between Canada and Italy, Giuseppe brought his wife and 3 children Teresa, Mary & Francesco (my dad) to live in Thorold. They became naturalized Canadian citizens in 1923. Based on records and immigration requirements for able bodied people, I deduced that he lost his arm in 1924. 

He continued to work on the canal as a “loody man.” A lood is  like a plumb bob and is used to find verticality and water depths.

They eventually bought a 2-story brick house, raised their family, and belonged to Holy Rosary Parish along with many Italians.

Alien Darkness

On June 10, 1940, Mussolini announced that Italy joined Germany. The Canadian government designated Italian nationals—and Italian Canadians naturalized after 1922—as enemy aliens.” (My grandparents naturalized in 1923.)

Shortly after the Mussolini statement the RCMP’s (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) were ordered to arrest Italian Canadians who posed a threat to national security.

A burst of knocks—short, loud, urgent. He grabs the book, wedges it under his arm, yanks open the stove and throws the book into the curling flames inside.
The door bursts open—uniformed men storm in. No words. No warrant. A rough search, then they’re gone.
 He turns back, reaches into the embers, and pulls out the book. Edges blackened, pages smoldering—but still whole.
One arm, one breath, one quiet victory: the poems—and he—survive.

Between 1940 and 1943, Italians in Canada were afraid to keep anything in their homes that tied them to Italy. Under the War Measures Act, habeas corpus was suspended. Over 31,000 Italian Canadians were fingerprinted, photographed, and forced to report monthly to authorities—guilty until proven loyal.

Months later, a government official came to the door, curtly demanding to know where his son—my dad—was. He did not report in.
Papaco didn’t flinch.
“He didn’t report because he’s at Fort Benning, Georgia—training with the first unit of Canadian Paratroopers.” 

In 1990, former PM Brian Mulroney gave a full and unqualified apology on behalf of the government and the people of Canada “for the wrongs done to our fellow Canadians of Italian origin during World War 2.”

Some Things I Know- Some Things I Don’t

Here is what I know. Mamaco & Papaco lived in Canada. Their oldest daughter Teresa married Jimmy Salfi  and lived in Sudbury.

Their middle daughter Mary became a US citizen, and married Frank Rizzuto and they lived in Pontiac, Michigan. My dad also a US citizen now, married my mom Ida Rizzuto and lived near them. 

By 1950, dad brought his parents to live in Pontiac and they became US  naturalized citizens and lived their days with my Aunt Mary & Uncle Frank. 

What I still don't know is how Papaco learned to read and where he learned to love poetry. 

Not For You

Papaco’s hunger to learn outpaced everything stacked against him—poverty, poor schooling, the rigid boundaries of his station in life. None of it stopped him from cultivating a deep, exquisite love of poetry.

And I get it. I’ve lived my own version of that story.

From elementary school through high school, my parochial education was a source of shame. I had ADD and was dyslexic. Reading was slow, sometimes impossible. When called on to read aloud, I was told to sit down until I could “do it right.”

I was placed in the slow track. Held back a year. Labeled a “flunkie.”
 But I could draw.

Even then, I knew I was an artist. Not “wanted to be”—was.

By high school, I’d grown an attitude to match my circumstances. I was in non-college-bound classes, and I’ll never forget what one teacher told me:
 “Don’t think about college. It’s not for you.”

Sound familiar?

I researched colleges on my own, applied, and got accepted. When I graduated, I went to the dean of fine arts to ask about MFA programs. He looked at me and said:
 “Have you thought about selling shoes?”

Plan B? No. There was no Plan B.

I built a portfolio, applied to ten grad schools. Got rejected from all ten.
 So I rebuilt. Reworked everything. Applied again.

Got accepted—on probation. Starting in beginner classes, while my art friends landed scholarships. Reading still made me freeze. So I studied harder. Worked longer. Drew everything I could.

Eventually, I earned two graduate degrees: a Master of Arts and a Master of Fine Arts.
 I took both diplomas to my studio, lit a match, and burned them.

Because only a lifetime of making art will determine whether I’m an artist.
 And I can report:
 I am.

Just like Papaco, I came up in a world that said, this isn’t for you.
And just like him—I answered back,
“Watch me.”

And sometimes, I wonder—did I have just enough of him inside me?
 Was he helping me through the hard parts, nudging me forward?
 I believe our ancestors stay close.
 They walk beside us, quietly.

And maybe that’s why, even when I was most lost, most doubted—
 I never felt alone.

Do Like The Romans

Did you know that in ancient Rome, families kept busts of their ancestors right in the front of the house—on full display in the atrium? You'd walk in and bam—there they were, watching. It wasn’t about decoration. It was about remembrance, honor, legacy.

These weren’t just heads on pedestals—they were a declaration:
 “We come from somewhere. These are our people.”

At funerals, they’d even parade the busts through the streets—literally walking with their history.

It gets me. Because maybe that’s what I’m doing in my own way—bringing my ancestors back into the room, giving them space, letting them be seen.

This is how I remember. This is how I know who I am.