WGBH Radio; The Callie Crossley Show

I'm Cally Crossley and this is the Cali Crossley Show. The oft quoted advice to budding writers is write what you know from Ont. based author Vincent Pinella has been his writing life doing just that first in his memoir Growing up Italian in America. Now in his new book Lost Hearts and now a lovingly crafts short stories fictional moments based on the experiences of the thousands of Italians from Sicily who made their way to America with Pinella as our guide we look back to 950 Queens to talk about what his fictional characters Gina and Charlie Marino can tell us about the quintessential immigrant experience. Later we're taking your calls for another edition of pop culture with axe Dog Lady Monica Collins. The doyen of dogs is back in the studio to discuss all things dog and answer your questions. Up next from traversing the immigrant journey to walking the dog. First the news. From NPR News in Washington I'm Lakshmi saying one of the world's

most wanted war crime suspects retcon linage is in custody. NPR's Philip Reeves reports a 69 year old faces trial before an international criminal court over genocide and atrocities in the Bosnian war in the 1990s. Some a lot of it has been on the run for years. Today the world caught up with him. The news was announced by Serbia's president Boris Tadic. Today we closed one chapter from Jupiter for our recent history that will bring us one step closer to full reconciliation in the region. But it faces a stack of accusations over his role as the Bosnian Serb military leader he led the long siege of Sarajevo in which thousands of people died. Perhaps the most notorious crime against his name was the execution over several days of some 8000 Muslim men and boys in Tripoli in 1995. The worst massacre in Europe since the Second World War. Philip Reeves NPR News.

The National Weather Service says there's a relative lull in severe storms that unleashed tornadoes in the South the Midwest this week. Authorities say dozens of people were injured in the latest system to strike Missouri Illinois and Indiana but this time no deaths. Indiana police sergeant Brian Ollie He says flash flooding is still a serious threat in his state. Trees and limbs down at 12 power lines. We also have reports of a local city and or county highway agencies using plows on the front of trucks of it with snow to clear debris. Meanwhile emotional and painstaking recovery is underway in Joplin Missouri site of a monster tornado that killed at least 125 people. Residents are still searching for relatives and friends who are among the hundreds of people they haven't been able to locate since the storm struck on Sunday. More disappointing news about jobs and economic growth though on Wall Street we're seeing numbers go up with the Dow up forty four points of the Nasdaq up 17. NPR's Joe Snyder reports it's a first rise in three weeks after declines in unemployment

claims. Economists had expected new claims to decline rather than rise in the Labor Department which comes up with its weekly figures from data provided by the states says no state mentioned extreme factors that would account for the jump. Even though tornadoes and floods have been plaguing several states in the Midwest and south. The four week moving average did improve slightly it's considered to be a better measure of trends in the job market and it declined for the first time in seven weeks. However it's still above the 400000 mark a level that economists say needs to come down to be consistent with sustainable job growth. Joel Snyder NPR News Washington. The Dow up five points at twelve thousand four hundred trading of just over a billion shares are seeing Nasdaq gaining 18 points more than half a percent to 27 79 and S&P 500 up three. This is NPR News. The March earthquake and tsunami in Japan have companies they're still trying to mitigate the disruption they caused. JOHN MATTHEWS reports on Tokyo based Ricoh company which

says it's shedding 10000 jobs in an effort to turn around its misfortunes. Rico president Sheetal condo says the company will cut almost a tenth of its 109 thousand employees around the world in the next three years and no area of the company is immune condo's says another 15000 employees will be shifted to higher growth areas in an attempt to refocus and streamline the company's operations. Rico says a paperless trend based on the growth of smartphones and tablets is partly to blame for sagging sales. Like many of the Japanese companies Rico has suffered from a strong yen which makes it harder to sell Japanese goods although the Japanese disasters damage some Rico factories Ricoh stock price responded well to the new announcement with a 4 percent jump. For NPR News I'm John Matthews in Tokyo. The Libyan government is again offering a ceasefire with the opposition. The Spanish government reportedly says it received that message but the European Union will not recognize a truce until Libya take certain steps. Europe and the U.S. are backing the Libyan opposition's demand that leader Moammar Gadhafi relinquish power immediately.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety in the US is out with the results of a small car crash tests. Chief Research Officer David Zuby says vehicle safety has improved over recent years including the Ford Focus Honda Civic the county Elantra and the Toyota Prius. They offer good crash protection in front rollover rear crashes or what products to control at least a dozen small cars were tested. I'm Laxmi saying NPR News. Support for NPR comes from the broad superintendence Academy preparing senior executives to become superintendents in urban school districts learn more at a broad Academy dot org. Good afternoon I'm Kalee Crossley This is the Cali Crossley Show. You mean

some of you may recognize a 1957 recording Omari by Louis Prima. A popular Sicilian American band leader. Surely some of my guests Vincent panellists to Cillian relatives were fans of premisses relatives he's written about from most of his career. Vincent Pinella knows what it means to be a writer. He started as an engineering student switched to the Iowa Writers Workshop found work as a small town cub reporter and didn't look back. He's clocked years teaching the craft thinking about and talking others through the process and at long last he's turned to his own life to his Italian roots to his upbringing in 1950s Queens to cull material from and to bang it all out in front of a typewriter and a shed in Vermont. What's come of all this is a memoir as Sturrock old novel and now a new book Lost Hearts. It's a collection of short stories tracing native Sicilians from the homeland to the sticky melting pot streets of New York. Benson Penelope joins us today as part of our occasional series with local authors to talk about his latest book.

Vincent the bell agreed to have you here. Thank you it's a pleasure to be here. There are twenty three short stories in Lost Hearts and they are linked but each of them stands alone. But they mostly center around the Marino family tell us who these people are. Well the Marino family are not quite in a typical family in the sense that their origin in Sicily is not. They didn't come here for they didn't start here for economic reasons the patriarch of the family Peter Marino in a sort of quintessential conflict with his father killed his father accidentally. But over fighting over a mule and his father's lover and Peter escaped to America told everybody in town that he was going to Australia. Of course they all knew the real story. So the book law starts begins with that story and. The first part is to Sicily in 1900 when Peter has this mishap or with his father. The second part of the story is 950 when Peter comes back to look up his

fiance who he had to abandon who actually bore him a son but he didn't know that. So the opening story is about Peter's the family's origin in Sicily. The next story is called Lost Hearts is the title story takes place in 1050 Queens and the stories after that take place Queens Brooklyn and as the sort of consistent with the path of Italian-Americans in this country they move out to different parts of the United States and eventually into the suburbs where Charlie who was Peter's grandson eventually who has the same conflicts with his father as Peter did in Sicily. The conflict is really repeated. Finally toward the end of the book in the last few stories reconciles with his parents. So there's a character arc to Charlie. But in between Charlie you find Charlie traveling a path through the cycle of life through teenage growing up years hostility toward his father who tried to control his life eventual

reconciliation with his father as his father grew older and with his mother. And on the way you will meet the other members of the family friends of Charlie that he grew up with and all of them go through the cycle of life of marriage divorce violence adultery things that I saw and experienced as a person growing up in this environment and things that I. Just motivated me to write. I just felt that. In order to write this I would have to not flinch take the hand that was dealt me in life and do what most writers do what most serious writers do is try to process your life into art so that these stories might not be true and they might be true some of them are true but are there. Theyre really modified by memory. Let me well let me let me ask you a question about that because you did do a memoir and I assume that that's nonfiction and so when you read returned to this subject matter to this material to these experiences and to some extent as some of those people what one would

presume you decided to fictional or write was a memoir has to be pretty close to fact fiction can take fact and process it into another kind of truth. I wrote the memoir a long time ago long time ago. I dont think that. Today I would write the same memoir. Oh really. I think I would have been less harsh on my parents and less harsh on my on my on the fact that they tried their best only they just didn't quite know how. My father for example was my way or the highway type of person and this is not unique to Italian Americans but sons and fathers don't always get along. Sons and mothers usually get along quite a bit better so that was the same pattern in my life. My my mother and father were divorced. Actually not divorced separated they were too Catholic to divorce and separated when I was about 20 and they stayed separated. And that's the story. The stories also reflect that but I think that the memoir is much more tame and when you write fiction you're allowed. You can use your imagination and you can actually find what I

think is the bigger truth. Because you can take the stories and your experiences and you can make something out of them. Because a memoir if you just simply wrote your memories down it wouldn't be a story. It's very hard you have to be very lucky to get a story out of your memories. Sometimes that happens. Arthur Miller wrote a view from the bridge for example about Italian-American immigrants in which the whole story of life was just consistent with art but that usually is not what happens. If you want to write fiction you have to lie deceive exaggerate and invent. Yes. And so these stories and lost hearts you know the basis of the basis is my memoir of a while ago. But there are much more I think there's a lot there's more there's a there's a more of a truth to them. You could be both as I think I guess you could be bolder and I think that they. They reflect what Faulkner called the human heart and conflict within it with itself which is what I tried to do. And there are also a like I said before there are only modified by memory but memory is selective.

You can't remember anything every time you remember it it would be different if I wrote these stories today they would be different. Well I would like our listeners to hear a little bit your voice on it let's start with the original sin which is the first in the series of 23 short stories and Lost Hearts and I'm speaking with and my guest is Vincent Pinella he's a Vermont based writer and his new collection of short stories is called Lost heart so from original sin. Well this is one of my favorite stories in the book. This is about Peter Marino who comes back to Sicily after 50 years to look up his fiance and to re travel the path that he that he that he walked in 100 when he killed his father in a fight over a mule while he was sleeping with his father's mistress in a place called the watershed which is in here. And Peter is now back he's in the 70s. He's sitting beside him at a little cafe in the middle of his

town. And he's thinking about everything whether this woman will come back to him because his wife is dead. So here he is drinking a cup of tea in the Piazza in the small town. And he's thinking what did he have for. What did he have at home. What did he have for grown children busy with their own lives. A lonely apartment on a street empty of its original character and associations. How long did he have it 76. Five years. Another five until he lost it all together. The bright day warmed rapidly and he felt the gentle lift from the TV. The usual collection of old men sat around the fountain. He saw no familiar faces. The men were better dressed than they used to be and there weren't so many in black. They seemed in better disposition. One or two of them eyed him suspiciously but that was to be expected. A tour bus was parked nearby half up on the curb. He went to the house and unlocked the door with the key he'd brought to America 50 years ago.

His feet made tracks on the dust in the first floor room. I've said the house is empty. His brother has because his brother died. His brother had sold off most of the furniture except for a few chairs and a rickety pine table. Peter pulled up a chair wiped it clean and set. He removed his hat dried his bald sweating skull with a handkerchief then took several deep breaths and exhaled a foolishness from his system. He heard his breathing in the empty room. So many Italians he knew had gone back at some point. He hadn't and he couldn't even after he learned that the police didn't care about his father's death. Who would trust police in a place like this anyway. He breathed slowly and evenly smelling death. Memories chased him. He smelled his father's white faced mule in the basement where it had been stabled. He saw the water shed with the green copper pipe Mordred into the cistern.

He remembered the darkness and then the sun exploding through the spaces between the stones. That was. In the watershed it was just a stone building and when he woke up that morning with his father's mistress his father was waiting outside waiting to waiting to leave the country and one of the mule that's from the story original sin the first in a series of 23 and my guest Vincent panellist book Lost Hearts and that one was out of the country. As we've said set in Italy and the rest of them are in one thousand fifty screens which we're going to continue to talk about. But what what do you think that the fictionalized Peter is but what the real folks upon whom they are based lost when they came to America and what did they gain. I think when they came to America they they brought their old values with them and they were in constant conflict with the between the old values and American values. The Italian values of family first of male dominance and female power

all met up with this free wheeling country in the United States. And a lot of them had quite a bit of difficulty with it especially on the marital and mean marriages were. At least at least in my experiences match marriages were a little bit more quite a bit tested in the New World and I think they tried to maintain their own values. They still do but they also lost their language in an effort to become Americanised to make money to succeed in America which is the you know see it succeeding in America is also at odds with just living a quiet life. Back in Italy except at Bagot back in Italy there wasn't anything for them most. They were all mostly Southern Italians and so there wasn't much down there and that's why they came. And the biggest immigration was in the you know around 1900 and mostly immigrants mostly Italian Americans you see in the United States are from the south probably 70 or 80 percent they're from Sicily or Naples or south of Rome. It's

where the poor those are the poor areas of the country those of the poor the part of the country where the people are a little bit darker skinned suffered quite a bit of prejudice from the Northern Italians who were more Germanic whose influences were less Mediterranean. So. They came to America OK they came to America to succeed and many of them did. I mean they have succeeded right in the store with my guest Vincent Pinella about his new book The Lost Hearts. I'm Kelly Crossley and we're talking with the Vermont Vermont based author about the collection of short stories. Looks at transplant of Italians living in New York and building lives for themselves in an unfamiliar landscape. We'll be right back after this right stay with us. Support for WGBH comes from you. And from Harvard Extension School.

Information technology courses and part time graduate degree program information session June 15th. You can find more information online at extension dot Harvard dot edu. And from masterpiece on WGBH 44. If you missed the new upstairs downstairs or if you want to experience the secrets lies and scandal again watch the entire series Saturday night starting at 5:00 on WGBH 44. The next fresh air of The New Science of Dog Behavior. Some trainers say don't let your dog win at tug of war. You'll appear submissive. Not true says John Bradshaw. If you do let a dog win over and over again a tug of war likes you it wants to play with you more than it did to begin with because it's having fun. New book is Dog Sense. Join us this afternoon at two on eighty nine point

seven. The forty sixth annual WGBH spring auction is going into extra innings. That means there's still time to secure some amazing deals. Bid high on a luxurious getaway for two to the seven like all inclusive adults only beach front escape to relaxing Jamaica generously donated by the jewel Dunn's River Resort and Spa. And all the sparkles a little brighter the jewel and Boston's TNT vacations vacation is sunshine online at WGBH dot org. We're running out of oxygen. I have so many people that I can treat the world and it's not an easy decision for anyone to make. Coming up at 3 o'clock on an eighty nine point seven WGBH Boston NPR station for news and culture. Good afternoon I'm Cally Crossley. This is the Cali Crossley Show. If you're just tuning in we're talking about Lost Hearts.

A new book from Vermont author Vincent Pamella it's about native Sicilians making a new life for themselves in Queens. Vincent Pinella is stopping by as a part of our occasional series where we sit down to talk with local authors. So Vincent de Mello I think these stories are small deliberately so that they create the sense of community and a very much of a closeness I felt while reading them they were you know about these people as we've described but just about their everyday lives and along the way we get so many Ronder full hints about the culture and what they were doing to try to make a new life for themselves here. Well they are written small. They almost always start out with the detail with a sensual sensual detail of people mixing cement or a couple dancing on a gymnasium floor or two boys as in the story following originals as the title story Lost Hearts it's about a group of 13 year olds who form a gang

because they want to beat up the schoolyard bully. And. What I try to do is develop these original details into some kind of a conflict and into some kind of or into some kind of a hole without telling the reader exactly the meaning of the story because I think the action should bring the meaning out I think I'd like to really leave the reader with a sense that something happened they know very clearly what happened and without any of authorial intrusion. I'd just like to point out and show what happened in this in this in the incident or incidents that inspire the story. I would say that most of them are unresolved at the end. And I wonder I figured you were doing that deliberately because life is unresolved. It seems to me that there are 20 MB is running through all of the stories. You know one is the father son conflict the other is love and betrayal. Did I get that right is I going to write it's very right you know and I don't resolve the

stories because I don't it's not only that I don't think life is unresolved I do believe that but I think as as an artistic strategy it would be pretty easy for me to tell you to tell the reader what the meaning of the story is. But then it would seem it would take away the appreciation or the appreciation of the reader who would who I hope would come away from the story and think about what happened and think about the meaning of it rather than my telling it. If I tell it. And that's pretty easy. What's harder is to show it and to show it in a vivid way. And there is a lot as you say about the culture if you read through the stories there is the the idea of food there is the idea of sensuality and vision as a visual quality to the stories and I think that's that's even though that's the Italian part in me I am an American I was born here raised on American literature but I do have an Italian sensibility and the Italian sensibility is very visual has a lot of reds in it. You know if you go you know the cover of this book is read a resume read

that you see in Pompei if you've ever been to Pompei. So I try to bring that attitude to the stories without preaching I don't want to tell people what the stories are about because I want them to appreciate the stories as if they happened and to see the stories as real something real that happened in fact. Felt as though in most of them I was interim into the conversation the conversation was going on I happened to stop by and then just entered into it with your characters that's how it feels in the writing of it and sell that. That's what came across I feel I would be very successful if people say to me did this really happen because it sounds like it really happened. And that would mean to me that I was I wrote the story successfully that some of these things happened yes some of them that I see some of them or do some of them yes and no that doesn't matter. What really matters is what I do with it. Right because like I said before as I said before even if I tried to recall those memories time time would time

would change them sensibility would change then my own might the changes in my own character would would modify what I saw it's like in science where you have what they call the Heisenberg uncertainty principle where if you shine a light on on a particle on a subatomic particle it immediately distorts it and so you can't really get a picture of it because you're energizing it. So you and what happens is that the writer is that you energize something with your memory when you focus on your bank. Every. For me I have a bank a bank of material which I hope I don't use up. But you when you focus on things in that bank they change. And then they say. And if you're lucky enough they'll change into a story. So that's how it works. Let's talk about just the the your very specific focus not just in Lost Hearts but of course we're talking about that. But in your memoir about being a tell you an American you know in Boston we I think Irish-American takes a little bit of presence though there obviously

is a community of Italian Americans here. Providence of course in the region all the way through we're aware of that. But you know so often I hear artists say what I want my work to be is universal. I wanted to be able to speak to anybody to get them to understand what's going on. But you have a very particular focus in this and what is it that you want us to take away from the fact that these stories are about Italian Americans and their experience I'd like you to take away the idea that Italian Americans are like everyone else. I don't think that they as a group. And I'm perhaps projecting I don't think that as a group they have. Managed to distance themselves enough I think the mass media as they do with all ethnic groups has done quite a job on Italian-Americans in portraying them as stereotypes the stereotype of the gangster The stereotype of the Romeo the stereotype of the chef or. And I think Italians are still trying to work that out as a group among themselves. But there's no escaping what I am.

There's no escaping that I grew up in a home where my grandparents spoke a language that they could not write down and a language that I couldn't understand a language that I didn't want to understand because I wanted to be an American was only later in life that I learned Italian and the irony there is that the Italian that you learn in books is nothing like the Italian that Sicilians and southern Italian speak because they speak a dialect. And and since they're literate they can't teach you that. So it was only later after Sadly after my grandparents died who would have loved the fact that I studied Italian. But they're gone. But there's no denying that Italians are a distinct group. They lost their language. I think part of the reason why they lost the language because they wanted to assimilate so much and they had an incredible work ethic. They were hard workers and they lost their language they became successful. On the other hand they still haven't they still haven't kind of gotten out of the stereotypes that the mass media has.

Molt at the mass media has cast the man so I mean you're not a fan of Sopranos are no I'm not you're not you're I'm not a fan you know that's a that's. That's an example I've seen parts of parts of the Sopranos I mean I've seen parts of those shows talons are a big group and they're a diverse group and those they are not representative of what Italians are not at all talons read Italians or in the Supreme Court or talons are in every walk of life. Italians are secure they're stoic and they don't really for the most part they don't. They really don't fear these stereotypes and this sort of indifferent to them even though like in the eggs in the example of The Sopranos quite a few Italians watch that show. Yeah. And those are just part of the stereotypes of the Talons I think are still wrestling if you if you just look at for example in The Godfather The image of The Godfather is more mythical more romantic. Those gangsters won't like that image of the gangster in The

Sopranos is a little bit slightly more realistic but really I didn't. Not that I know any gangsters but I don't really find these people to be. As character is very interesting and I think in real life what people should recognize is that in real life gangsters are nasty people. Yeah I think that's what they were trying to get across in The Sopranos frankly. I really want you to read again from libation this time the chapter called libation But before you do I wanted to quote from a review that I thought sort of helped would help my listeners encapsulate what all of these 23 stories kind of touch on the reviewer says Pinella focuses on the issues that other writers tend to avoid. The misery of that binds the family to each other fulfilling the proverb that misery loves company. Many of these stories are tough and deal with adult issues that in the past children were more likely to witness firsthand abuse infidelity gambling drinking illness disappointment old and new

love and fear are just a few of the life challenges that these stories grapple with. Together they remind us that the Italian-American family is more than the stereotypical Happy-Go-Lucky tribe that smiles sings and talks with their mouths full of delicious food as they gather around the Sunday dinner table. I thought that was a I think it was a great I will accept such a compliment in a humble manner. I'm grateful for that. All right here's my guest Vincent reading from libation libation is a story about a father who finds his son drinking in a bar. His son is underage and what's. Again I told you I said before that I don't like to give a message of the story but I will for the sake of your listeners. What's happening in this story is that the father and son the father is trying to control the Son and the son is trying to be en dependent like most teenagers. But what the son has done has staked out a world that his father cannot touch. And this is the world of mythology that this son Charlie reads

about. There's another story in the book culture all the marinas on this odyssey where he's in high school class and they're reading the Odyssey and it shows you what a great affection he has for the Odyssey. Now in this book this story is called libation libation as you listeners know is when the ancients poured alcohol of wine of something on the ground as to for the favor of the gods. Charlie's father happens to own a bar. So the idea of Charlie's affection for the Greek mythology in the ancient world and his father's owning of a bar and the idea of libation came together for me to make this story. Now what happens here is that Charlie's father takes him to his bar to give him an object lesson on the evils of drink. So Charlie is sitting at his father's in the basement of his father's bar. Thinking that his father will be violent with him and punish him for drinking. But there's a different is a different outcome. Charlie relaxed a little. Emerging from the jacket

he's wearing a jacket beginning to believe that his punishment for drinking the night before would not be physical but something else. A lesson in the evils of alcohol. On the night before Charlie and his friends had been drinking in a neighborhood bar called Harry Martens which is actually a real place in Jackson Heights a supper club fall into ruin and so desperate for business that the most poorly altered proof of age was accepted at a certain point. Charlie told his friends about the ancient custom of libation demonstrating this by ordering two shots of Seagram's 7 crown and pouring one on the floor before throwing the second one down his throat. Harry Martens had a square bar and after setting the empty shot glasses on the bar to the laughter and applause of his friends Charlie saw someone staring at him from across the bar. The man had a glass to his lips and when he set it down Charlie saw his father Hank. Then came around to Charlie's side took him by the elbow and guided him out the door. At the same time

telling the bartender that he could lose his license for serving minors. Hank pulled down a case of Muscatel ripped it open and cut the federal stamp on each bottle cap with a knife. He then unscrewed each cap and emptied about a fourth of each bottle into the empty pot with ladle and funnel. He refilled the bottles with water and screwed the caps back on to the point where the stamp came together again. He turned each bottle two or three times to mix the water and wine. Next he filled four empty bottles. Three quarters of the way with the wine already drawn off the top of these with water and screwed the caps back on. Standing over Charlie he said this is what you get when you're on the wrong side of the bar. He picked up the parts and held one in each hand as if to show Charlie the evidence. Charlie wanted to say that he and his friends didn't drink cheap wine but decided to remain silent. Well the story goes on until they arrive at home and the father

confesses to the son that he does that he's at a loss. What to do with him. Let me let me ask this question because that keeps coming up in my mind of course. You've admitted that some parts of these these details are all well autobiographical I suppose so is Charlie you are you Charlie is me for sure not and I mean he's definitely I invest myself in every one of my characters. But I'm definitely invested more in Charlie than in the others there's no there's no way to back out of that one. And I think that you know if you look at other writers for Philip Roth for example is one of my favorites I mean he writes books in which the characters are named Philip Roth. When I say Charlie is me it doesn't mean that I did all the things that Charlie did. What it means is that I I'm kind of. I inhabit him as a character as I inhabit the other characters but I inhabit him most and the things that Charlie does are things that I agree with and the struggles that he goes through or struggles us that I went through but maybe not in the

same way as in the stories but if I if you if as a writer you get lucky enough you can you can kind of you can make a story with the same theme even if even if the things did not happen to you or if they did sometimes the things that happened to me in life are too horrible to write about. Sometimes I'm lucky enough and I can and I can succeed in creating some kind of a narrative that holds up. As I said before they're the human hearted in conflict with itself and I think that's what Charlie goes through. I mean he's in conflict with his father. The book is called Lost Hearts and I wonder did you lose your heart in this time and space that you write about. No. Lost Hearts I think writing for me is is to create life out of a lost world you want to recapture a world that's gone. And I think that's where the title comes from. It's not that I lost my heart it's that I'm trying to bring this back. It's kind of like it's almost like photography where you

can take a photograph and every every minute in life is unique is unique in fiction you can do the same thing only it's a little more work but you want to preserve something that happened to you or you want to preserve a time period a period of time and certain characters and the way to do it is with an art and that's what art does is preserves life. Well you certainly preserve some precious memories in this book. We've been talking about talking about writing and about coming to America for Italian-Americans with writer Vincent Penelope and talking about his new book Lost Hearts we're going to go out on Zuma Zuma a 1944 recording also by Louis Prima. If you want to find out more about Vincent Pinella and his work you can find more information and a link to the book Lost Hearts and our website WGBH dot org slash Calla Crossley. Thank you so much friends and familiar welcome. Thank you. Up next it's another edition of pop culture ass dog Lady Monica Collins is taking your calls at 8 7 7 3 0 1 8 9 7 8 8

7 7 3 0 1 89 70. If you need advice Now's your chance call now. 8 7 7 3 0 1 8 9 7 8. We'll be back after this break. Stay with us. With the support for WGBH comes from you and from the New England mobile book fair in Newton. For 54 years New England's independent bookstore. The New England mobile book fair. Find them online at an e-book fair dot com. That's an e-book fair dot com. And from foot stock where you can find European comfort and fashion footwear that caters to active and casual lifestyles in Wellesley square Main Street in Concord center and Newbury Street in Boston's Back Bay. Foot stock shoes dot com. Next time on the world a beverage made from coca leaves and cola nuts first concocted

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College in Boston. For more information visit race Amity dot org. It's time for another edition of pop culture. Joining me in the studio is Monica Collins aka ass dog lady or as we like to call her family Fido Queen canine mutt maven princes of pooches and the royal hound Highness. Well I think she's here today to take your calls if you need advice about your four legged friend have concerns or if you're wondering whether to get a dog or not. We're 8 7 7 3 0 1 8 8 9 7 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. We've got only 20 minutes with Monica So time is of the essence. You can also tweet us or post a question to our Facebook page. Michael welcome back. Thank you Kelly. Before we go to colors I want to talk to you about this. Isaac Mizrahi comet Isaac Mizrahi some of my

listeners may know is a pretty famous designer. Yeah more lamb buoyant. Yeah a little bit flamboyant had some television shows and given to you know wild proclamations right. Well he just came out and said that his dog is a natural people repellent and this is the quote he gave to People magazine people come to my house and they get bitten and barked at and terrified and they run away screaming. The designer told people pets dot com at the Good Shepherd services Spring Gala in New York. He added with a twinkle in his eye he's kind of a monster. What what what what do you what do you think about that. I have to tell you that I don't think much of it. I think that it is in bad taste and decidedly not funny. When you make jokes about your dog's bad behavior i.e. you can make jokes about your dog. I don't know what chewing the grass digging indiscriminately. There are many many things that dogs do that are can be

funny. Kweisi but biting people. Yeah I wouldn't That is not funny to me I can tell you as a non dog owner no it's totally not funny and it was a very irresponsible comment and comments like this just send me crawling up the wall because I think oh I hope people don't think just because I was right he said he has a lot of money he could have. He could put his dogs with a trainer. He could do anything for his dogs. But why joke that there are people repellant. Yeah just to continue what he said was in some ways this kind of genius because he wants people in your house. Oh nice that you came over Thanks for dropping in just teasing. So that's saying why he wants the dog to bite. OK I'm glad it strikes you too as I mean because you don't have a dog. No I don't have a dog and I would be the by T. Not a happy camper. In fact Isaac Mizrahi been missing a few limbs and yeah really couple things. Couple of breaking news. Breaking dog news stories

again. One there is the Main Line Animal Rescue is sponsoring billboards in Los Angeles and directly appealing to Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore to tweet and help dogs in puppy mills and that's because Ashton Kutcher as you may know has seven million followers on Twitter. Yeah and Demi Moore his wife has over 3 million followers. They are dog lovers. And so this group is putting up signs saying hey a few celebrity treats can help thousands hundreds of thousands of dogs confined to puppy mills. I don't know how I feel about that. I don't know whether you want to lay the guilt on to get celebrities. I think it's fine if they choose to do so themselves. But putting up big billboards and all and asking to me an Ashton to do this. I guess it's OK but I'm uncomfortable with it a little bit. You shouldn't it should be a guilt thing with celebrities they should just want to do it. Want to help. Yeah. Well so far they have not responded so maybe they're taking your word. OK.

Jean from Rhode Island you're on the air with dog lady on the Kelly Crossley Show. Go ahead please. Hi Jane. Hi. I don't know if you want to know you have some rest. I want your first article here to take get your response to me. I have rescued three portals over the years. But I heard what I have here is about 10 pound females. A key obviously was the abuse that had a full four years. Yeah we've been through several BT and classes I've had trainers to the house and behaviorist. She's been diagnosed by Dr MN as the fear aggressive dog but I think he's more of a reactive dog. And I I have to kind of keep people away from her because she just doesn't want anybody in our house but the question I have is when I'm walking her around we walk a lot. Yeah she reacted to other dogs and people she wants to go after them she wants to attack them. Yeah and I sometimes I've used the spray bottle that works. But is she protecting me I really protecting herself because she was abused.

It's hard to know isn't it. It's hard to know. I and you're good to her and she loves you she doesn't bargain but you know she loved when she bit me once because I was pulling a rope. Way from someone she had and I didn't understand her. Her body language is hard to know. It is hard to know whether she and she's a small dog so that must scare her knowing she'll go after anything. She's not okay to vent it she's up she's got dominant personality I've been told and she's she's a little bully. All right well she's a little bully. What can you do. I hope that I hope you carry some two things with you or you have at least mastered the sit and stay command. Have your up you we have but not outside in a reactive to a well key but keep trying it outside in a reactive situation. And hey I hope dogs on a leash too. Yeah oh yeah you know yeah. Also if you know things get bad you may want to think of a muzzle as well for her while you teach her the sit and stay.

But I would also carry always treats so that you can do a quick sit and stay and then give her give her a treat when she's quiet and just keep trying and trying and trying and trying repetition is the mother of invention with dogs really. It's true. Thanks for the call Jean I'd love to tell you but there's a million people on here we're dying to talk to. Dog lady so I got to move on thank you. Amy from Boston Go ahead please you're on with Ask Dog Lady Monica. Thank you so much for that dog. Good question but I hope that's OK. Oh I love them big. The bourbon neighbor I mean love our neighbor we love watching a cute big dog and I would give myself good marks for picking up dog poop I have no problem going out with a plastic bag. But we have a number of neighbors that have asked us specifically also not to let the dog hear any and I've no problem with that I have a neighbor to ask but I guess it's just raise this level of question in me like I want to walk my

dog I want to be respectful and know if I see someone with like the emerald green lawn and they're obviously going to be really careful but you know we're walking along a sidewalk I don't let the dog like Rome way up to the house but you know they're on a six foot lead right. Right and what is that a kit of the hats. It's hard to know. I'll be very honest with you. Early on in the early morning when I leave with my dog and my dog pulls me toward a bush on somebody else's lawn to peddle. I have to tell you that sometimes I let it happen myself. Am I a bad person you're right. You wonder What's the etiquette. I think of someone standing out there you're not going to let your dog pee in front of someone who's like this and there are many people that are fine with it that you know are just totally fine with it but I think that you have gone to great lengths already to be aware of it to be responsible for it Amy and I was like it's like a don't ask don't tell if they have. Absolutely it's situational ethics I have a question Amy but for you

and Doug lady and that is if you go to the same lawn every day you know I would have NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO RIGHT. No they never do that. All right this is an occasional thing. All right and Amy you would say you don't do that either. Not intentionally I mean it is true you know the people that may be living near the house you know we try to kind of walk more quickly but I don't. Well you know I had a woman one morning a woman came out of her house early one morning and Shorty was sniffing around her lawn Shorty in shock ladies surety is the dog lady's dog Yes thank you. And she came out of her house to say please move on. And that was that the only one. You know that was that though forever after. Well that's good. OK you know I constantly you know respect by that house we go right by it don't even go near it. All right thank you thank you thank you very much. Yes great call situational ethics. Sally from Glasser Go ahead please.

Hi there Kelly. I'm Monica I have a brand new 11 week old puppy. And God. This puppy has more chew toys than any dog in history. But she thinks the whole world is her chew toy and how best to think just replacing my foot with a chew toy. Are there any tricks to teach your What's a chew toy and what's a dining room table leg. Yes definitely. How long should it take. It takes it takes a while Sally I would be prepared for this for about six months or until she starts losing her baby teeth printers that happen that happens before six months around six months. You'll notice a little. Either they swallow their baby teeth or you'll notice little teeth around the house. You don't have to give any money to the tooth there yeah. But what I would do is you have to be vigilant you know when she starts chewing on your fingers you have to have something for.

Offer her an alternative. Have you invested in the con toys yet. That's a hard question to cry but you know it's hard rubber. Yes yes she likes that. I just always have something bully sticks which are controversial here. But another one is the the Himalayan choose choose that are all natural for dogs. You should just have a variety of chew things that you can substitute. OK that's great Also you have to. She has come from a mother presumably and a natal Nast. Yeah in the natal Nast when she bit her mother or when she gnawed on her siblings they yelped. They were really good people anyway that you have to do that you have to let her know it's not by a big NO with a big whack at all but it's like a sound that lets her know. No that's not right.

Don't do that. Great. All right thank you so much and thank you. Well you're right. 8 7 7 3 0 1 8 9 7 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. This is a calla Crossley Show and I'm here with Ask Dog Lady Monica Collins Ariel from Dorchester Go ahead please you're on the Kelly Crossley Show. Hi Ariel. Hi my other friend. Out in a third of the urban neighborhood. Yeah it is me and Belmont. Yeah he has a 1 and a half year old bulldog who I I am on the phone with my friend and I can hear that the dog is jumping over the fence into the garden and my friend is saying no no no no no. And I guess he has about a week. I spent around her garden. Yeah and I'm wondering maybe if there is a way. Any ideas you have or suggestions to help or keep the dog out of the garden. Yes keep the dog in a crate. Keep the dog in the house keep the dog out of the car again.

You know that's how you do it like to have her in the backyard but you want her to stay out of the fence area. Well if she's prepared to stay out there with the dog. Yeah every time the dog. Yeah but she's on the phone with you and you're hearing no no no no no. First of all it's important to realize the dogs don't speak English. They really don't play with there's no yesterday there's an occasional French poodle that speaks French. There's an Italian port. What are dogs. So what happens. You have to school your dog yourself you can't go NO NO NO NO NO I'M ON THE PHONE NO NO NO NO NO DOn't DO THAT No no no get back here. I'm not going to work that way. Kind of maybe reward the dog for not going in. I don't I'm not a dog owner so I'm not really that. Well you're very kind to call. Yes she should be worried the dog she should make it fun for

her dog to stay on the chosen side of the fence. And when the dog starts to wander she should say put the dog on a leash and pull the dog back. No. Stay here. The dog sits and stays or stays and you give a treat. Good dog. You always let the dog know what is acceptable behavior and you do that by restricting the dog's activity. OK. Thank you very much so much I'll pass that on to you. The big single mom and she doesn't really have much time. Thank you so much. Well it'll never be easy if she keeps the dog on a leash. Well OK thanks so much. Thank you very much Ariel for the call we're at 8 7 7 3 0 1 8 9 7 8 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. Doug let me I want to talk to you about this other breaking news about dogs. There is a group in Virginia that are working animal rescuers from a group called dogs deserve better to buy the house that Michael Vick.

You know he was convicted of dogfighting in this big house. And at the time it was called bad news in E-W XE kennels that's what he named the house when they were doing the dog the dog fighting. Well this group wants his raising money to put a downpayment on the House and they want to rename it good news in a W Z rehab center for chained and pinned dogs. So they're looking to put almost $200000 toward the down payment of the $600000 house. We think about that. Great. Any kind of rehabilitation effort on. I think it's great. I think it's really good. There are a lot of dogs out there in the United States not so much right here in the Boston Cambridge area that are kept outside chained. Maybe a lot of these dogs do need rehabilitation and this could be a very good thing. It kind of mirrors the rehabilitation that Michael Vick has himself gone through really. You know he's now a spokes person for yeah I'm not into it and I'm not into it.

He was supposed to appear on Oprah I think a few months ago and he bagged out of that. I'm not ready to. It's not it's not a big things. Not my shoulder but I'm not ready to hear Michael Vick as the spokes person for dogs. Yet you know if ever I don't know but I just don't see how someone could do that with dogs and then do one hundred and eighty degree about face but that's just me. Well I think people can be really rehabilitated. You know he seems pretty pretty sincere other than I you know what you mean about the dogs that you know the Good News Kennels So yes maybe there is a chance. All right here's a letter that was sent to you. Not really quite recently. This is from one of your readers and listeners. Our four year old be shown to Dickens runs with me three days a week four to five miles per run plus gets a 10 to 20 minute walk three times every day. He sees a vet regularly weighs an approximate 15 pounds eats well has good digestion is a perpetual delight

but sometimes he just plops down at home as if he's exhausted. Is it possible to exhaust a four year old dog is too much exercise making him old early. We're counting on Dickens being around for a decade or more. Oh I think Dickens will be and I think Dickens is benefiting mightily from ever all the exercise that he's getting. He's a small dog so he can have gargantuan exercise because dogs get tired. They love to sleep. I have a friend that once said he was referring to his dog a smallish dog and he said Oliver is nothing without his 23 hours of beauty sleep. And honestly a lot really they need sleep. Even your early ones even you even young ones especially young ones puppies sleep all the time. So when your dog and you should also know that if you've provided a nice place for your dog to sleep either a comfy crate or a very nice dog bed and your

dog just wants to go there. Dogs need their chillout zones they need to be away from they need to go to their spot and they just need to put their bodies down and just sleep. Puppy Cave puppies can't. Exactly thank you so much dog Lady Monica Collins writes the syndicated column Ask a dog lady. You can go to ask dog lady dot com to ask a question or make a comment or visit the ask dog lady Facebook fan page and you can keep on top of the Kelly Crossley Show at WGBH dot org slash Calla Crossley follow us on Twitter or become a fan of the Calla Crossley Show on Facebook today show was engineered by Jane pipping produced by Chelsea murders. Well Rose left and Abbey Ruzicka where production of WGBH radio Boston's NPR station for news and culture.