all right, I’m fine.
T
:
Then—what else did your father tell you?
A
:
Everything …
T
:
Everything
A
:
Well, almost everything. That night I told you about—the first memory—the bus. I was right about that, my father said. We were running away. Going to a new place to live. And that day in the woods, with the dog. We fled into the woods because my father thought he had spotted one of Them—
T
:
Who was Them?
(9-second interval.)
A
:
I’m not sure. I think I knew once—maybe it will come back to me. But that day in the cellar my father told me who I was, who he was, who we all were. Suddenly I had a history, something I realized I had never had before. Everything changed in one afternoon, in that cellar, in a few hours …
His father’s real name was Anthony Delmonte and he had been a reporter in a small town in upstate New York. The name of the town was Blount, population about thirty thousand. Famous for the high hillsveined with granite that loomed above the town. Those hills drew a few Italians across the Atlantic a hundred years ago, men skilled in the uses of marble and granite, among them the grandfather of Adam’s father. The quarries dried up after a while but the Italians remained and became assimilated into the town and the state. These were light-skinned blond Italians from northern Italy. They grew no grapes on terraced slopes. Adam’s grandfather was the first of his generation to seek an education; he graduated from law school and was modestly successful, conducting a law office in the heart of Blount. Adam’s father did not seek a career in law. He was drawn by the written word. He completed his studies at Columbia University in New York City and attended the Missouri Graduate School of Journalism. With his degrees tucked into his suitcase, he returned to Blount and became a reporter for the Blount
Telegrapher
. Soon he was promoted to staff reporter, then to political reporter. He loved working for the newspaper. He was intrigued by the power of words, not the literary words that filled the books in the library but the sharp, staccato words that went into the writing of news stories. Words that went for the jugular. Active verbs that danced and raced on the page. Roscoe Campbell, owner and editor of the
Telegrapher
, encouraged Adam’s father to go beyond the superficial aspects of stories, to find the meanings below the surfaces, to root out what might be hidden or not apparent to the casual reader. He won the “Small City Reporter of the Year” award, presentedannually by the Associated Press, for a series of stories involving corruption in Blount—an official in the Public Works Department involved in kickbacks connected with purchases of snowplows and trucks. Roscoe Campbell was delighted. Occasionally he allowed his award-winning reporter to spend a few days at the state capitol in Albany. Once again, the owner beamed with pride—how many newspapers of similar size received exclusive stories from their own man at the State House?
Meanwhile, Adam’s father and mother met and married. She was Louise Nolan, blue-eyed and dark-haired, a shy beauty, the younger daughter of tragic parents. Her mother had died giving birth to this second child, and her father, an artist of modest reputation in the Blount area, was seduced by beer, whiskey, rum or rye or whatever balm came in bottles. He froze to death one January night, having tumbled in a stupor to the snow-covered pavement of a back alley. The hardworking young reporter rescued Louise Nolan from her grief and they were eventually married in St. Joseph’s Church, Adam’s mother having been a devout Catholic all her life—religion, in fact, had always sustained her through bad periods, particularly after her father died. The wedding was modest and unpretentious; the parents of both were dead and they had only a scattering of distant relatives in that section of the state. After a honeymoon at Niagara Falls, they settled down in a
T
:
Then—what else did your father tell you?
A
:
Everything …
T
:
Everything
A
:
Well, almost everything. That night I told you about—the first memory—the bus. I was right about that, my father said. We were running away. Going to a new place to live. And that day in the woods, with the dog. We fled into the woods because my father thought he had spotted one of Them—
T
:
Who was Them?
(9-second interval.)
A
:
I’m not sure. I think I knew once—maybe it will come back to me. But that day in the cellar my father told me who I was, who he was, who we all were. Suddenly I had a history, something I realized I had never had before. Everything changed in one afternoon, in that cellar, in a few hours …
His father’s real name was Anthony Delmonte and he had been a reporter in a small town in upstate New York. The name of the town was Blount, population about thirty thousand. Famous for the high hillsveined with granite that loomed above the town. Those hills drew a few Italians across the Atlantic a hundred years ago, men skilled in the uses of marble and granite, among them the grandfather of Adam’s father. The quarries dried up after a while but the Italians remained and became assimilated into the town and the state. These were light-skinned blond Italians from northern Italy. They grew no grapes on terraced slopes. Adam’s grandfather was the first of his generation to seek an education; he graduated from law school and was modestly successful, conducting a law office in the heart of Blount. Adam’s father did not seek a career in law. He was drawn by the written word. He completed his studies at Columbia University in New York City and attended the Missouri Graduate School of Journalism. With his degrees tucked into his suitcase, he returned to Blount and became a reporter for the Blount
Telegrapher
. Soon he was promoted to staff reporter, then to political reporter. He loved working for the newspaper. He was intrigued by the power of words, not the literary words that filled the books in the library but the sharp, staccato words that went into the writing of news stories. Words that went for the jugular. Active verbs that danced and raced on the page. Roscoe Campbell, owner and editor of the
Telegrapher
, encouraged Adam’s father to go beyond the superficial aspects of stories, to find the meanings below the surfaces, to root out what might be hidden or not apparent to the casual reader. He won the “Small City Reporter of the Year” award, presentedannually by the Associated Press, for a series of stories involving corruption in Blount—an official in the Public Works Department involved in kickbacks connected with purchases of snowplows and trucks. Roscoe Campbell was delighted. Occasionally he allowed his award-winning reporter to spend a few days at the state capitol in Albany. Once again, the owner beamed with pride—how many newspapers of similar size received exclusive stories from their own man at the State House?
Meanwhile, Adam’s father and mother met and married. She was Louise Nolan, blue-eyed and dark-haired, a shy beauty, the younger daughter of tragic parents. Her mother had died giving birth to this second child, and her father, an artist of modest reputation in the Blount area, was seduced by beer, whiskey, rum or rye or whatever balm came in bottles. He froze to death one January night, having tumbled in a stupor to the snow-covered pavement of a back alley. The hardworking young reporter rescued Louise Nolan from her grief and they were eventually married in St. Joseph’s Church, Adam’s mother having been a devout Catholic all her life—religion, in fact, had always sustained her through bad periods, particularly after her father died. The wedding was modest and unpretentious; the parents of both were dead and they had only a scattering of distant relatives in that section of the state. After a honeymoon at Niagara Falls, they settled down in a
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