"Love Letters from la Pineta" by DailyGood volunteer Jane Jackson is more than a book -- it is a living gesture of love that wings its way between the visible and invisible world. A book that embodies hospitality in its deepest sense. For to truly welcome love and all its bright gifts we are required to keep our hearts open when grief's shadow descends. And that is exactly what Jane does in this book letter by heartfelt letter.  Written in the years following her beloved husband Blyden's passing, the letters are addressed to him, and to Jasmine their granddaughter who arrived on this Earth after he had "changed address." She writes them from Mornese -- the Italian town she and Blyden had dreamed of visiting together, and that Jane pilgrimaged bravely to alone after his transition. She finds miraculously waiting for her there in a community of less than a 1000 people-- a deep sense of home, and a sense of belonging." What follows is an excerpt from 'Love Letters from La Pineta'

Introduction

Writing has served as a source of healing for me twice in my life when it appeared that the bottom had fallen out of my world. Both times writing was of great comfort, taking a different form each time. First it was in the form of simple poems written in tandem through email with my son Aaron Jackson, who lived 3,000 miles away in Los Angeles at the time. Our shared writing helped me to recover my use of language and joy in life after a near death experience in the form of a brain aneurysm. The second time writing helped me to heal was through letters written to my beloved husband of 38 years after his death (he by the way had saved my life immediately after the brain bleed on his birthday in 2006, by getting me immediate medical assistance). These healing letters form the basis for this book. They are dedicated to Jasmine, our granddaughter, born September 4, 2014, so that she might one day know one of the love stories that helped to create her, a magical beam of hope in our family and in our world. Though she and Blyden did not get to spend earthly time together I have no doubt that he “knows” her and loves her deeply. In her constant quest for learning and seeing all there is to see, and in her sheer joy for life, I see her Grandpa Blyden and feel his continued presence in our little circle of life. And I can hear him say to her, as he did so many times to me, “You’re my horse, even if you never win a race.”

Almost three years after he saved my life, Blyden was diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer. By the time of his diagnosis the cancer had already spread to his bones, leaving him in considerable pain. After a biopsy the surgeon said he had three to six months left to live but never one to succumb to despair, he continued to live as fully as possible for another three and a half years. During this time our love only grew as our family united in providing life sustaining love and support. Our son Aaron and his wife Jan moved across the country from Los Angeles to be present for us in New Jersey, giving up their work and their lives there, with Aaron flying home immediately and Jan driving across the country with their belongings and our two grand-dogs, Annie and Reggie, in tow. Our daughter Gail lived nearby already and as Blyden’s illness progressed and his activities became increasingly limited, she became his staunchest cheerleader and helped immensely with his care, to the point of giving up her job to help care for him when he became bedridden. Working together we were able to ensure that when the time came, he died at home, surrounded by his loving family.

Late in the first year of his illness Blyden sent me this email that I still carry with me in printed form. We had gotten in the habit of emailing frequently during the day when I was at work, as a way to stay connected. This one still fills me with love and gratefulness: “You bring me peace. It is such a great gift. I am so thankful that I am sharing my walk with you. Bly”. Throughout his illness, in order to be fully present for him, I forced myself not to think of life without him, if the physical miracle we hoped and prayed for did not happen. It wasn’t until after his death on April 29, 2012, that I allowed myself to give in to the sadness that came quickly and mercilessly, leaving me lost without my partner of almost 40 years, unsure of even who I was anymore.  I continued to work but found myself often crying, even in public, on the way to and from work and whenever and wherever the tears overtook me. Fortunately I had a good bit of walking to do as a part of my commute to and from work, almost 3 miles of walking per day. Walking was a comfort and a way to keep from sinking into depression. I felt many days that if I could just walk long and far enough, and never stop, I would survive.

Almost a year and a half after Blyden’s death I made a trip to Mornese, Italy, a trip that was life-changing and empowering beyond anything I could have imagined. This trip and ones that followed it formed the basis for Love Letters from La Pineta. These letters, written over the course of three years, were initially hand written in my journals kept while visiting the small town of Mornese, in the Piedmont section of Italy, during the month of August each of those years. The first were written to Blyden three years after his death, at the time of what would have been our 40th wedding anniversary. The letters of the next year were written to our granddaughter Jasmine, who was born a year and a half after Blyden’s death, and the letters of the third year are to both Blyden and Jasmine.  Mornese brought me a sense of being alive, a sense of hope, which Jasmine also brings to my life, both of them providing much needed comfort and solace in my time of darkest grief. The fact that the letters come from a common place (la pineta, the pine forest surrounding Mornese) to both Blyden and Jasmine, who never spent time on this earth together, links the two of them for me in a tangible way, honoring the circle of life within my heart and our family. This circle consists of our son Aaron and his wife Jan and daughter Jasmine, and our daughter Gail and her boyfriend Andy. La pineta represents my past (Blyden, who never spent time here but whom I transported to this nurturing place in my heart, making a leap of faith, never having traveled out of the country by myself and never having met in person my soon to become lifelong friends, while speaking only minimal Italian), my present (the me I am now, still evolving, as a single person after almost 40 years as half of the team that was our marriage) and my future (our granddaughter Jasmine, who I hope will one day read them and know of the immense love which both created her and surrounds her. She will never have the good fortune to know her Grandpa Blyden in person and I struggle with how to convey to a young child the essence of someone who would undoubtedly love her with his whole heart if he had only had the chance. It is my hope that these letters will give her a little window through which she can catch a glimpse of him. The letters represent for me and I hope for our family and anyone who reads them, the hope of resurrection, of renewal, that life offers us in times of deep loss and grief.  As a sign at the entrance to Mornese invites all who enter there to “Vivi, Respira, Gusta,” “Live, Breathe, Taste,” I invite you to travel with me to live and breathe and taste along with me the wonders of opening to what life offers us. Andiamo, let’s go!

Love Letters to Blyden, August, 2015

I first discovered the magic of la pineta in Mornese, Italy in August, 2013. I had made a pilgrimage of sorts there, a little more than a year after Blyden’s death, as an expression to myself that I was still alive even though I felt lost without my partner of almost 40 years. We had a good friend who lives near Mornese, Rossano Pestarino, whom we had gotten to know and love and who became family through correspondence over the previous five years, after he purchased a rare book from us on Amazon.com, on the little used-book business that Blyden and I enjoyed conducting there. Rossano and I struck up a conversation after he purchased this book, emailing each other back and forth, sharing our life stories and ourselves. I shared his letters with Blyden and soon he was writing to both of us. At the time in Blyden’s illness when we became extremely focused on his health and well-being, as happens when a family member is gravely ill, Rossano provided us with a much needed daily link to the outside world, a world where we could just be, away from illness and fears, and a world about which we could learn and dream. We fantasized about going to Italy one day to meet Rossano in person but Blyden’s illness and then his death prevented that from ever becoming reality. Years before I had read the little book of letters between a New York City writer and a used bookstore in England from which she purchased books, 84 Charing Cross Road. I vowed that I would not be like Helene Hanff in the book, who put off going to visit the bookstore for many years, until after her best friend there had died. And so, in 2013, feeling I needed to prove to myself that there was life, hope, newness and discovery still ahead for me, and tired of the constant presence of sadness that was dragging me down, I embarked on my first solo trip out of the country for the purpose of meeting Rossano in person and thanking him for the incredible support and light that he had brought to our family, especially in our darkest moments.

I was inspired by Blyden’s own inability to give in to despair as his days became more difficult. When our friend Chi Modu from church visited him on one of his last days, instead of bemoaning his situation he asked Chi to “tell me something good” and Chi proceeded to tell him about his young children and their recent accomplishments, bringing a much needed smile to light up Blyden’s face and his spirit. I now totally understood and wanted to find my own “something good”. I felt compelled to find renewed hope and purpose in life. Since Blyden had gone into the vast unknown, I too felt compelled to go somewhere unknown and extraordinary, somewhere of my own volition, in order to resurrect myself, though I wasn’t conscious of that potential result at the time. I taped a smiling photo of Blyden inside my journal along with the baggage claim ticket and wrote opposite his photo, “Andiamo in Italia Blyden! Evviva!” “Let’s go to Italy Blyden! Hurray!” He was definitely with me. 

That first trip was more empowering than I ever could have imagined. I call it my magical mystical Mornese journey. As I prepared to leave for the airport I could vaguely remember the young woman I was in 1970, flying off to Kentucky from Vermont where I had lived in the same house for my first 21 years, to start my first nursing job as a visiting nurse in Appalachia, full of hope and anticipation. I didn’t remember fears then but I must have had some. Now I headed to Italy 43 years later, again traveling alone, but with so much more than I had then---a wealth of loving experience, a lifetime of love with Blyden, Aaron, Gail and Jan, so many friends, and the dearest friend, Rossano, without whom I would never have thought of being an adventurer again.

I had the perfect cab driver from my home in Bayonne, N.J. to the Newark airport. His name is Joe, Giuseppi. His grandfather was from Palermo and before he came to the U.S. he studied at La Scala in Milano. Joe was the youngest of 11 children of an Italian father and an Irish mother. His father was a performer in vaudeville. After Joe dropped me at the airport I was astonished to see the crowds and to realize how many people fly internationally. As I waited at my gate I enjoyed catching phrases here and there from conversations my fellow passengers were having in Italian. I wondered about them, who they were, what they were doing in NY/NJ, if they were from Italy and if they were from here, why they were going to Italy.

I worried that maybe I had forgotten the meager Italian that I had studied. Who am I---who are we---if we don’t have words? And if our love is not physically present? I wondered lately, as I sensed that I have aged since Blyden’s death, would he even recognize me? And now, would he know this world traveler me, whom I surely don’t recognize myself? I hope so, and I hope that he will always recognize and know me. Forza e coraggio as Rossano has often reminded me, strength and courage. I slept very little on the overnight flight. As we approached Milano, the light shining on fields of clouds signaled the new day, domenica, Sunday. I had left New Jersey Saturday evening and had flown into tomorrow, today! Buona domenica in Italia. Majestic snow-spotted mountains, the Alps, kissed the clouds as we soared above both in the approach to the airport, a half hour from landing.

I took a cab that I had prearranged from the airport to Stazione Centrale in Milano where I met Rossano for the first time. We recognized each other in the crowded station and met as old friends. Rossano was every bit the friend we knew and so much more, and his friends and family welcomed me as their friend and family. Mornese became my spiritual home from the very beginning of my too short time there. Walking in la pineta, the pine forest around the little town, I found I could fully breathe again. I found myself. As I wrote to Rossano upon my return after that first trip: Mornese is one of the ‘people’ I met and came to love. It is the narrowest of roads, the oldest of colorful houses, fresh air that invites your lungs to fill to overflowing and then to exhale, piano piano, recognizing that there is no need to rush in the presence of such profound beauty. Mornese is the hills, le colline, dotted with grape vines in neat rows that speak of the hard work of its inhabitants, past and present. Mornese is its people, strong and proud and loyal and so welcoming to an American. It is a sanctuary, the home of Santa Maria Domenica Mazzarello (who founded the Salesian order of nuns), the home of a faith that conquered sickness, abandonment and loss of hope, that to this day nurtures seekers from as far away as Argentina and China (and even New Jersey!), calling them to a simple community that gave birth to a way of being that is far beyond imagining. Mornese is the hills, ancora le colline, providing a path to freedom, a walk which sheds the walker’s worries, each step keeping time with the rhythm of the wind singing through the trees. Mornese is the dream I dared to dream, the dream which met me, held out its hand, and filled me full, piena, with an abundance of beautiful vistas, enough to view in a lifetime of future dreaming. Mornese e’ sempre unico. Mornese is always unique!

I was able to practice my Italian, which could only improve. Rossano’s sister Raffaella, whenever I said something correctly in Italian, would say, “Brava Jane.” I told her that I can see why she is such a good preschool teacher, with her abundance of encouragement. I tried to teach Rossano’s Mom, Gina, some English but she made it evident that she thought that was a crazy idea. Though she did share a few words in her English repertoire, including maxi, as in maxi dresses and skirts. She showed me her wedding album when she and Rossano’s father, Albino, (sadly dead since Rossano was 11 and Raffaella only 8) were married in 1973, two years before Blyden and I were married. Gina, whose full name is Luigina, was wearing very 70’s white boots in the wedding photos and she and Albino looked like movie stars in all of them. Thanks to Gina I learned a fun expression in Italian on my first visit .When I had lunch at Gina’s she brought out different courses, one after another, and I became extremely full. I kept saying, “Grazie Gina ma sono piena,” “Thank you Gina but I am full.” One time when she went into the kitchen yet again Rossano instructed me to say, “Sono piena come un’uovo” “I am as full as an egg” literally. And when I said that Gina got the message that I couldn’t fit another bite of her delicious food.

Memorable friends I made include Grazia who used to teach middle school with Rossano (she teaches English and Rossano calls her la signora inglese) and her husband David who is from Liverpool, and their daughter Karen, and Emanuela, who also taught with Rossano some years ago (she teaches Italian and Rossano calls her la signora italiana) and her boyfriend Marco. Marco is a native Genovese. I was told neither he nor Emanuela speak English but in the course of driving us on a tour of Genova, Marco proceeded to speak beautiful English, as did Emanuela. I discovered that these lovely newfound friends may be self-conscious and shy about speaking English because they don’t get to practice it often, but we were soon chatting away like old friends. I completed a yellow and white prayer shawl that I had started at home, not knowing who the recipient would be, but thinking it would come to me in Italy. Emanuela was luminescent in her beauty and her smile which lights up her whole face, and I knew she should be the one to receive the completed shawl.

Rossano deserves a chapter, even a book, of his own. I “knew” him from our years of sometimes feverish correspondence. We knew his heart and he knew mine and Blyden’s. Now there are three dimensions to that knowing. He often asked me, during the visit, “What would you like, Jane? What would you like to do?” He carried my bags all week long, including my knitting bag which he had to open for inspection before we could enter Il Duomo in Milano. Rossano says he can’t sing but he indeed can, quite beautifully. I truly can’t but nonetheless we sang a little duet of “Finche la barca va” at Gina’s dining room table. At the airport as we wandered the halls of the Sheraton before I left to head home, we sang again and a gentleman with a turban passed and very generously said, “Nice singing!” Rossano received all of my stories of Bly and our family and our lives with a gentle welcome, treating them all like a gift. It was wonderful to be together and to get to know him in a real way. It was very difficult leaving Mornese and my friends who had become like family. I could really appreciate Gina’s words that Rossano often quoted in his letters before we met, “Se fossimo un po’ piu’ vicino.” “If only we lived a little closer.” If only!

I visited again in the summer of 2014, for two weeks, feeling this time at home, not at all new or strange. Angelo, the owner of Il Campo dei Papaveri, my B&B there, welcomed me like family. This time I became a real part of Mornese life, shopping in the shops, having coffee in the morning with several ladies who meet regularly at the start of each day. I invited a young man in his family’s local graphics store, Matteo, to stay with me when he and his girlfriend Martina were planning to come to NYC for the Christmas holidays and their visit, spending 10 days with me as they fell in love with New York City, was another life changing event. I became zia (aunt) Jane and obtained another whole branch of my Italian family. Matteo and Angelo are on the Town Council of Mornese and I asked Matteo if he thought I might be able to donate some money to the town for a new picnic table for la pineta, as a way of saying thank you to Mornese for the renewed life and hope it had given to me at a crucial time in my life. When Matteo returned to Italy he spoke to the Mayor, Simone Pestarino, and the Town Council, and the donation was arranged, the funds transferred, and Claudio Mazzarello, a local artisan and craftsman, was commissioned to make a new picnic table and bench donated in Blyden’s memory for our 40th wedding anniversary this year, on August 2, 2015. I spent that anniversary in Mornese, ensconced on the bench for hours, meditating, remembering, cherishing, being grateful, and learning to continue to breathe even while letting go. The letters that follow are love letters that I wrote to Blyden, from that bench and picnic table, and one written after I returned home. He is part of Mornese now because his spirit soars over la pineta as he is part of the great immensity of life that he loved so much to ponder. He is there and here and in my heart and in the hearts of our children, granddaughter and other loved ones. I am there with him and I am also here, me, a whole person, also part of that great immensity but still with a physical body that grounds me to the here and now and enables me to live life and love every day renewed by the spirit that flows through us all and unites us for all time.  

July 31, 2015

12:45 AM

Dear Bly,

I am sitting here in my special and beloved room at Il Campo dei Papaveri Bed and Breakfast (that’s The Field of Poppies in case your Italian is a little rusty!) in Mornese, Italy. It’s the middle of the night and even after a sleepless night on the plane to Milano from Newark, I keep waking up, thinking of you, missing you. Tears of longing and absence are flowing readily now. I am so very fortunate to have this place, my place, where I first came two years ago, and where I come again, seeing the me that is now, the me that can be, and that is to be. When I woke up just now missing you, surrounded by the memory quilt I made last year, and thinking of how warmly I have already been greeted by folks here and how many more welcoming faces and hearts I will see later today and in the days to come, I had the thought that it takes a village to even approach giving me the feeling of being welcomed and loved that you gave me, just you, each and every day.

This grief business has a strangle hold on a part of me that keeps looking, searching, for something missing---knowing full well that that something is you and that the hole in my heart can’t really be filled. A person can live with a hole in her heart it appears, but sometimes I have the sense of moving forward while dragging a useless withered limb that can’t be severed.

I have so very much for which to be grateful. I am, and I thank God every day for the beautiful family we created, for Aaron and Jan and Gail and Andy and the most incredible Jasmine (I can’t bear the thought of you not having met her in this life, our sweet granddaughter, instead I am confident that you know her in a more real way than we can imagine), for Mom and the rest of the family, for Rossano and everyone here and all the friends at home, some who are dear friends like Reni and James and Jess, who are moving to London next week bringing a piece of my heart with them, whom you also never got to meet in life. I am so grateful for work that I have come to love, and the fact that I was able to sell the car and move to a less expensive apartment, and for Grace Church and so much more. I feel God’s presence tangibly in my life and for that I am most grateful. I am calmer now, piu tranquilla, just by writing to you. Obviously I must write more often, to feel our bond, our love, which endures. In two days it will be our 40th wedding anniversary. I wanted to be here for it, here where I came the year after your “transcendence” (that’s what I’ve taken to calling your death, like you called my aneurysm “the incident” as a way to maybe deny it a bit but also to make more palatable something that is scary and devastating). I really do feel calmer writing to you, thinking of you, feeling your strength. Letter writing has always been for me a way to express my feelings, and so I will try to continue writing to you whenever I feel this powerful need to feel your presence. I think you would be happy to know that I’m doing okay, I’m moving forward, “guarda avanti, non fermarti,” (look ahead, not back) an expression Rossano taught me some time ago, even if I am dragging that withered limb. For the most part only you and I and God can see it.

By the way, I just looked up from the bed where I’m sitting writing and noticed that the mirror on the wall in this room, my room, has three little sunshine images with smiley faces, and they make me smile back at them! Another thing that makes me smile is the fact that Angelo, the dear owner of Il Campo dei Papaveri, my Mornese home, had on my bed waiting for me the memory quilt I gave to him last year, made from some of your clothing and that of Maurice, Marion and Gram, my other dear loved ones who have passed. Last year I entrusted it to Angelo because he is a keeper of the history of Mornese. The Bed and Breakfast is in the former home of his grandparents and their photo looks down on me from the wall as I am writing. I knew your spirits would be safe in Angelo’s care and that you could all rest in the beauty of le colline, the hills of Mornese. Now I feel surrounded and warmed by your presence. What joy!

Love,

Your Janie  

PS I was met at the airport in Milano by Megu of La Comunita San Benedetto al Porto in Genova. We had never met in person but Rossano and I visited La Comunita briefly last year. They do work very similar to ours at Project Hospitality, working with people who are homeless, inspired by don Andrea Gallo, prete della strada, priest of the street, who died the year after you but whose spirit continues to nurture all those who are marginalized in any way, just as yours continues in our hearts. Megu used to be don Gallo’s driver. I felt so honored in his presence. Rossano had given me books in Italian about don Gallo last year and I read them with my Italian-English dictionary always at the ready, being greatly inspired by don Andrea Gallo and the work of his Comunita, the work of welcoming all people. One of these books, Sopra Ogni Cosa, talks about how love is what matters, above all else. It is this same book that introduced me to don Tonino Bello, who was an Italian bishop and a great man of peace, the head of Pax Christi, who died in the 1990’s but whose profound words also resonate for me and touch me deeply.

I had printed out a quote of don Gallo’s to keep as a reminder on my bulletin board at work: “Sempre con coraggio, cerchiamo di continuare ad essere ‘trafficanti’ di sogni.” “Always with courage, let us seek to continue to be traffickers of dreams.”   In thanksgiving for the inspiration of don Gallo’s words and how they have touched my heart, I wrote a prayer to him, with Rossano’s translation assistance. Last year when we were able to visit la Comunita a group of people were practicing a play, “A Day in the Life of la Comunita.” We were allowed to sit in on their rehearsal and I asked if I could read my prayer to don Gallo to them after they finished. My hands started shaking as I began, realizing I was in the presence of a holiness that comes from suffering and sharing and triumphing over that suffering, amidst these followers of don Gallo who are keeping his life’s work alive. Everyone was instantly supportive, offering me a drink of water, a chair to sit down and collect myself. As I looked at the intense and loving faces that responded to my love for them and for don Gallo, I read these words in my imperfect Italian: “Carissimo don Andrea Gallo, forse non ti sei mai visto come i santi, ma cosi e’ come ti vedo io. Percio, ti prego per i miei cari, perche loro sono come la gente con cui hai lavorato e chi hai amato. Anche loro soffrono l’isolamento, il dolore, e la mancanza della speranza. Sai bene queste cose, e sai come potargli il sollievo. Sei, secondo me, l’angelo custode degli isolati, e di quelli senza speranza. Cerco il tuo aiuto per loro, per ora e per sempre. Grazie, e ciao bello, ciao.” (“Dearest don Andrea Gallo, maybe you never thought of yourself as a saint, but that is exactly how I see you. Thus I pray to you for my dear ones because they are like the people with whom you worked and whom you loved. They also suffer from isolation, from pain, and from the lack of hope. You know these things well and you know how to bring them relief. You, according to me, are the guardian angel of those who are isolated and without hope. I seek your help for them, for now and for always. Thank you, and ciao dear one, ciao.”) It was such a moving experience. At the end of my visit last year, with my suitcase stuffed with books by and about don Andrea Gallo, don Tonino Bello, and David Maria Turaldo, another priest who is dead and was a poet of some renown, Rossano accused me of carrying a suitcase full of dead priests. These “dead priests” continue to inspire me and countless others. I would love to help to increase an awareness of them in the United States. We so need people of inspiration these days.

Megu drove me to where Rossano could meet me, then Rossano drove me to Mornese and my home there. As Rossano drove up to Mornese we passed field after field of sunflowers. It was startling and thrilling to see so much yellow, your favorite color, a sure sign of your presence. We found Angelo setting up for Il Mercatino, a used books and other goods sale to benefit the town, and Elio whom I met last year passed us on the street. They both gave me warm welcoming hugs. Rossano and I then walked a little ways into la pineta and caught each other up on our lives. I am so grateful for his continued friendship and our ability to really connect. Then we went to Lerma to the pizzeria where last year we met Ruslan, the pizza maker from Belarus. He seemed to remember me when I said I was Jane from New Jersey and that I had taken his photo last year when he asked me to make him famous on facebook. I had the same pizza I did last year, called Jasmin pizza, which is by now tradition in honor of our sweet Jasmine.  

With Love,

Janie