Centuries in the Making
Ariana Franco, Runyon Canyon Hike, January 1, 2020, photographer Jared
At the beginning of last October I wrote a blog post about where I was at that moment in time. I described a little bit about my experience of life during the pandemic. Well I’m here to tell you that things have changed AGAIN. Big changes. I want to rewind a bit. Let’s go back to January 1st 2020 when Jared and I embarked on an adventure to Los Angeles for 5 days. It was our first time in the city. We loved it and it loved us back. On our trip I was able to spend an entire day with one of my favorite people and photographer, Jenna Peffley. Jenna and I have known each other for 17 years, half of my life. We lived together in college between 2006 and 2008 in a house we called Gladys. Jenna and I hadn’t seen each other in almost a decade so it was a welcomed visit and we picked up right where we left off. LA was exactly the way Jared and I wanted to start 2020. I had just come off a huge project and was about to start another one that I wasn’t totally convinced I wanted to do. On this trip I made the decision to push forward. When we got home I did that, pushed forward.
Life was the same as when we left 5 days before. I was back to my 10-12 hour work days. I pushed forward. Preparations, budgets, hiring, and details ensued upon my life. I was working what felt like 5 jobs, trying to remember to eat, California dreaming of the carbonara I had at Louie’s. Everything kept moving and I had blinders on to anything else that was happening in the world. By February huge progress was being made to open up the second Kalma Miami location at Aventura Mall and I was planning for Spring/Summer window and interior displays at Harmont & Blaine at Brickell City Center. I was barely aware of the first infection of COVID-19. I’m trying so hard to recall my thoughts and feelings but to be honest I was thinking the same way as most people. This will pass, just keep pushing forward.
Oh how wrong I was. By March I knew I should have trusted my instincts, spoken up, and done something. But I didn’t. I kept pushing forward, but with hesitancy. And we all know what happened on March 16, 2020. The world shut down, the world changed and with it my personal world changed. I covered quite a bit of what was going on those first few months in my Letting Go post last year. I spent March to October just kind of wandering around in my own mind, life, and home. I had so many ideas and I was desperately trying to latch onto any one of those great ideas and projects. I did things I had put off for so long, completing tasks, like the Artist’s Way 12 week workbook, and learning new things like illustrator and how to incorporate the use of laser cutting and CNC into my work. I needed that time more than I can express in words. I was able to clear my mind. Going into October, I really thought I had figured things out for myself, but to be honest nothing felt true to me. It felt forced, like what I was supposed to do, not what I am meant to do. I kept asking the questions, who am I? Where did my interests come from? Who do I want to be when I grow up?
Let’s take a moment to rewind again. It was Christmas of 2017, my brother got me the Ancestry.com DNA test. My brother has always been interested in our genealogy and family history. He has found 2nd-4th cousins living in Italy, visited them, and had been working on getting us dual citizenship in Italy. I took the DNA test and the results were very interesting! We know we are Italian, French Canadian and Acadian. My maternal grandmother Emilie would roll over in her grave if I didn’t specify Acadian. I had seen other family members creating trees on Ancestry.com and I had one started. Every so often over the years my brother had shared family history with me. I was interested in the information he knew and was sharing but had never done anything with that information. In July 2020 he sent me a text message with a photo of our Great Grandfather Giovanni Franco’s first petition for naturalization in 1919 with the encouragement to try to figure out who our grand aunt was, my paternal grandfather’s eldest sister. The page consisted of what looked like scribbled cursive names listed 1/3 down the page. I decided to jump on my ancestry account to see documents, did a bit of research, figured a few things out, and then got distracted with other project ideas, which was the result of my Letting Go post.
Maria Vincenza Rotondo (Franco-Forlini), wife of Giovanni “John” Franco, 1951, Wedding for her Grandson in New York c/o DeMarco Family
Flash forward from July to October 2020 and I was sitting on my navy blue futon in my office closet, cloffice, figuring out my finances and what I needed to do to make ends meet during this strange time. I was budgeting well, but still needed to trim some fat. It was October 24, I remember because this day is important. I was texting with my close friend who had recently quit smoking cigarettes and I had this feeling that it was time for me to try. On that day I made the decision not to go buy a pack of cigarettes, and I haven’t had one since. I also decided that I either needed to use my paid Ancestry.com account or stop paying for it. 8 hours later, I connected with my grand aunt Chiara Franco aka Clara DeMarco’s great granddaughter. This was the grand aunt my brother had been asking about in July. I realized I am incredibly good at research. The next day I got up and decided to research more. And the next day, and the next day, and then all of a sudden it had been 4 months and I found more than my brother did in 15 years. I reconnected with family members and I was so happy. I felt fulfilled in ways I hadn’t been in so long. I couldn’t stop talking about my findings to my friends and family. We even got a photograph of my great grandmother Maria Vincenza Rotondo (Franco-Forlini) who was born in Pontecorvo, Italy in 1883 and passed away in Bridgeport, Connecitcut in 1953.
As the end of 2020 was creeping around the corner I was helping my best friend plan her wedding and I knew that I was going to need to get into my studio to create 300 handmade paper flowers for her centerpieces and altar. I couldn’t help but feel different. Having learned a few new things about my ancestors, I started 2021 in back in my studio 5-6 days a week craving to be at my computer researching. Mid January my brother and sister in law bought their first house. I was tasked to help with some renovations before their move in date of Mid-February. Jamie and Howard had set their wedding date for March 14th and I was honored as her maid of honor. I enjoyed planning her bridal shower and making all the paper flowers for the wedding. It was such a magical wedding. Between January and March I was fully consumed with these responsibilities and if you know me I take this stuff really seriously, they were my priorities at the time. I wanted nothing more than my brother and sister-in-law's house to be a home, and for Jamie to have the perfect day marrying the love of her life, Howard.
It was a lot at the start of the year and by the end of March I was back to researching full time. I discovered that we had family members in Los Angeles that had come to America from Baia Latina, Italy in the 1960s. I had figured out that my 2nd Great Grandmother, Filomena, went to LA in 1953 but wasn’t entirely sure why. I decided to see who was still alive and if I could find a phone number to call and ask some questions. Everytime I looked at the tree, one name kept popping out at me, Edoardo. So I found his phone number. Here we go back to Los Angeles. Everyday for weeks I kept saying I was going to call and then I would get nervous and not do it. Until one day in April, it was a Saturday afternoon and I just did it. I called. A man with a slight Italian accent answered the phone and I asked if he was who I was looking for. I could hear the television loudly in the background. I also knew that I had called a landline, the rarity of that makes me giggle. He responded, yes! I explained who I was and how we are related. I had to write it out, “your father, Francesco, is the brother of my great grandmother, Carmela. I’m your cousin.” I was so afraid he was just going to hang up on me, but he didn’t. Instead he was so happy to talk. I asked him questions about his life in Italy, his parents, and grandparents. This man was born in 1936 and experienced World War 2 in Italy. He proceeded to tell me about his two children, he has a daughter in her mid-30s that was born in LA but grew up in Italy, and still lives there. I immediately tried to find her on the internet and through social media. 2 days later Nadia and I were communicating daily.
I sat there so upset that I hadn’t started my research earlier to know that I was so close to my family in LA right before this pandemic and had no idea. I was also so excited and grateful that my research, this work I had been doing started to make sense. It brought me something, it brought me to my people. Things between me and my ancestors are getting serious. So serious that in April when I got a call from a client for a new project, I started to cry and had this extreme feeling that I didn’t want to do it. I didn’t want to go to my studio unless it was related to my research. I had a total breakdown, angry, and distraught. I took the 6 month job anyway, because I still wasn’t convinced that I could make anything of my genealogy work. When I’ve been in my studio I listen to Italian American podcasts, and the history of the Unification of Italy, anything that will bring me knowledge that I can apply to this work. At the end of May, Jared and I were able to take a trip to New York. A much needed trip considering we had been at home since early 2020. We attended an Italian American birthday party for his step mother, and I met his step cousin’s wife whose family also immigrated to Bridgeport from Southern Italy in the early 1900s. I felt connected. That’s when I knew if I wanted to take my genealogy work seriously I would have to do something different.
In between studio sessions over the last 4 months, I’ve been researching and writing. I started collecting death certificates from vital records. I have gone back 7 generations in my lineage from Baia Latina and Villa Santa Croce, Italy. I’m getting better and better at reading Italian documents from the 1800s everyday. I have some very strong ideas on how to bring creativity into the way this information is shared. It can get very confusing very quickly. I now have hundreds of ancestors on my tree and it’s growing all the time. Nadia and I have become very close and we are so grateful to have found each other. The way our ancestors have brought us together is nothing short of magical. During my family history research, I started looking into becoming a Professional Genealogist. Everything led me to a 15 week online course at Boston University for a Certificate in Genealogical Research. I took this as a sign. First, I was born in Boston. Second, my father graduated from Boston University, and third it starts in September, right as I end my current client project. Still skeptical, I called a dear friend who knows a little bit about going back to school in your mid-30s. Between his encouragement, and my family's support I signed up.
Crest of Terra di Lavoro, the ancient province in Campania (found on wiki) The title and boundries of Terra di Lavoro was abolished by Mussolini in 1927.
I sit here today, in Miami, it’s 90 degrees out. I have my office window open and the smell of fresh cut damp grass is wafting in as the dark clouds roll in for an afternoon shower. I remember how lovely the weather was in LA. I’m surrounded by index cards taped to the wall with notes of passenger manifests, addresses, names, and a printout of a forged WW1 draft card for my Step Great Grandfather Luigi “Geech” Forlini. I imagine what a summer was like in Pontecorvo, Baia e Latina, Caiazzo, Alvignano, or Cusano, Italy in August during the 19th century. In one month I will be starting the online classes. The 15 week course is going to teach me more about researching, DNA, Genealogical Proof Standard (GPS), Forensic Genealogy, and being a Professional Genealogist. My world has changed and I have welcomed it. Everyday I do one thing that moves me closer to being able to share the stories of my ancestors from the province Terra di Lavoro in the region of Campania. The farmers, shoemakers, carpenters, tailors, spinners, weavers, and railroad laborers. The mysteries of these people who were once forgotten and unknown.
