Sad News: Giuseppe (Joe) Balsamo, 1919-2021

My neighbours on Wolverleigh for the first quarter century we lived here were Joe and Paolina Balsamo. The photo collage above shows their wedding picture in Termini Imerese, a picture of Paulina with Frank after Joe left for Canada, a picture of Joe and Paolina on Wolverleigh a few years before we arrived, and a picture of Joe with his son Frank at his 100th birthday in October, 2019. Brenda and I were privileged to attend that wonderful celebration. Joe’s grandson let me know on Friday that Joe had passed away the day before. What I said to him in my message was this: "Thank you for letting me know about your grandfather, Joe. I’ll pass the news on to other neighbours. We will all miss him. When we were out shopping for a window air conditioner 20-odd years ago, he introduced me to the clerk who was helping us as his “good neighbour.” I was touched at the moment; the designation meant a deal more more than the words themselves conveyed. He and Paolina were our good neighbours. Not a day goes by that I have not missed them."

Last night I played this song from an album I thought Joe and Paulina might have liked. It is the work of someone from this neighbourhood. "Cantu ri li scugghitura" is a wheat harvesting song from Michael Occhipinti's Sicilian Jazz Project. It comes from La Contea Di Modica, and the group's accordion player Gino Carbonaro told Occhipinti that it’s a typical donkey cart driver's tune that has been adapted with a very old text. In Sicily, peasants would be granted access to wheat fields that had already been harvested, and their job would be to glean whatever grain had fallen to the ground.

This morning there was a light dusting of snow and I went out to fulfill an obligation Joe and I assumed in 2003. I shoveled some front walks one more time in Joe's memory. You can find the explanation in this Facebook post. As I said to someone else yesterday, good neighbours are worth their weight in Ontario hard red durum wheat.