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Most fairy tales offer happily-ever-after endings. Pretty pink princesses get their dashing handsome princes, ugly green witches melt away, and Tinkerbell sprinkles her magical pixie dust all over the land.
Who writes these stories? Certainly, they are so unbelievable, and yet their far-from-reality ideals are exactly what they're serving ... for us readers to escape into the land of make-believe and smile at the feel-good endings.
Yet we know in life, snippeteers, mortals are not always granted happy endings. I'm sure you can think of a story in your past or that of a relative or friend, which - sadly - did not end well ... a situation OR a life.
My mamma's ending was a very, very sad one: she choked on sherbert (sherbert of all things!), went into cardiac arrest, suffered brain damage from lack of oxygen, and we four Team Molino siblings were forced to take her off life support. Such a HORRIBLE ending to a beautiful woman's life. I hate-hate-hate Mamma's undeserving ending.
Her papà, my Nonno Giovanni Mossa, an Italian immigrant from Sardinia, Italy, also had a tragic ending. At age 42, he had transferred from Brooklyn, New York, to Baltimore, Maryland, to work as a carpenter, building soldier barracks at Aberdeen Proving Ground. On the first day on the job - his first day!!! - he fell off a roof, broke his neck, and died a few days after. I hate-hate-hate Nonno's ending.
[In Mamma Gina's and my book, The Italian Immigrants' Daughter, which we wrote together in 2017, I always want my grandfather's ending to be different. I loathe the ending of his story so much that I wrote a fictional short story in which Nonno survives the fall and "lives happily ever" with our family.]
Here in Florida, my "cousin" Ronnie Perrott, only age 62, was paddleboarding last Friday, suffered a heart attack in the Gulf, was unable to be resuscitated by paramedics, and died. (I am reeling from this one, snippeteers. Grief upon grief. His funeral is Tuesday.) His parents, Joan & Ron, and my parents, Gina & Louie, have been connected as 'family' since before any of their 8 kids were born. I am very close to the Perrott family and Hubby and I gather with them each winter. Now, never again will we see Ronnie, how can that be???!!! I hate his ending, too.
Who writes these stories? Certainly, they are so unbelievable. Yet there is no escape from them, as we do when we read fairy tales.
They say fate is written. But do we write our own endings?
I was told that Ronnie, as a popular and very good dermatologist in this area, was almost always late in completing/closing out his current patient files for the week in his office. That's Ronnie! Busy-busy-busy. Yet during the week he died, he had completed/closed out his files as he was supposed to - to the surprise of his staff.
Did he know something?? Did he write his own ending?
Paula had written a brief loving note to my brother Danny, my little sister Pamela, and me, about how much she loved us, how complete we made her life, and how proud she was to have grown up Molino. Her husband found it after Paula died. There was no date.
Did she know something? Did she write her own ending?
I think ALL of us have asked that HUGE question at some point, WHY does God take people too young, give them cancer, or take them in tragic ways?
In fall 2023, while we were sitting vigil next to Paula as she was "fading," I turned to my priest friend, Father Hank, for emotional support in helping me to process and understand her tragic situation - and yes - that question. Here are Father Hank's exact words. (I had saved his email to read and re-read.)
"Don’t tell me about God’s plan. This is NOT God’s plan. God doesn’t want Paula dying at this age in this way. God is sad. Jesus is weeping. It’s the difference between God’s perfect will – what God wants – and what God allows – His permissive will. Paula's situation reflects God’s permissive will – God lets it happen. God does not WANT it to happen."
If I understand his deep philosophy, does it mean God allows people's bodies/health to do what they do, such as Ronnie's heart going wanky, Paula's cancerous spots in her brain to spread, and Mamma Gina's Parkinson's disease ultimately causing her to choke?
We have read and heard and learned over & over & over that we write our own stories. We create our exact situations in life – consciously or subconsciously – whether it is good stuff or bad stuff. We attract the people who are supposed to teach us something – whether they are good or bad people. We create, attract, and yes - even repel - money, fame, material possessions, relationships, sadness, happiness.
Yep, our lives are ALL our doing.
So whose to say that we don't also "pick" our endings to our stories?
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