Missing my Nonno

Isn’t it amazing the surprises life has in stall for us? At times I’m a little overwhelmed by the strange new directions this journey has pulled me through some painful, others colourful, adventurous but all unexpected. I imagined myself at this stage working as a journalist in some t.v or radio station with a novel or two bubbling up in the background, yet I find myself living here in Sicily, Italy bringing up Matthias, doing it all in another language and feeling like someone has just hit me over the head and cancelled the past decade of my life from my memory.

The hardest loss has been that of my adorable Grandpa, who died two years ago now yet his loss is still palpable for many reasons. Firstly that I never got to say goodbye, we were planning to go back to Australia the year he died as I was expecting Matthias, but my mother in law got sick and we postponed, then he passed away and we didn’t end up going back at all. So I didn’t ever see my Nonno either alive nor at his funeral.

It’s going to be hard when we go back not to see him at the airport, or when I can’t hug him hello instead of goodbye like our final goodbye during my last flight out from Perth. It’s going to be difficult to see my Nonna (Grandmother) alone at my mother’s house as she is well into her eighties and has felt the loss of Nonno greatly.

I still feel him so strongly in my life. It hurts to think little Matthias will never know him, that I will never hear his voice calling me darlin’ again, that he won’t be grilling meat on the BBQ for Christmas, that he won’t be insisting that we eat and drink more than our own body weight. Simply that such a wonderful character is absent from our company when we desire him so much. What a huge hole to fill.

Yet, my dear Nonnino, you are still surprising me, as I stumbled on a picture of you at my last birthday at home in Perth, Western Australia.

Do you remember? We went to Fremantle to eat at the Little Creatures Brewery. It was the hottest day of the year and we were all perspiring to death waiting for a free table, then we drank too much beer and went for ice cream after at Baskin and Robbin’s right there on the pier.

I found a lovely casual candid photo that I took of you sitting next to your grandson Damian, son Fil and daughter in law Rosanna.

You didn’t even see me take it, yet I am so glad I did because there you are my splendid, handsome Nonno.

One look at you makes me remember every happiness in my life, for a moment you are still here, held close without realising.