He Ain't Heavy (He's My Brother)

The time had come. M, P's brother was to leave for France to continue his studies and whatever else it is he's doing within the Catholic order. He came a few years ago, new to New York and even lived with us for a year. We had so many great times with him here. And we began our journey at the Savoia Restaurant on Smith Street, where we welcomed him and shared the best brick oven pizza and appetizers.

It became a bit of a tradition to come to this inviting, warm spot to talk and share with M. This time it was to be the last time. For a very long while at least if ever again.

M's super easy to be around and doesn't like speaking much about himself so thoughts and conversation always seem to drift back to us. As a matter of fact M himself might have a gift of mirroring as I call it. Instead of ever being able to focus on him, he always mirrors your self image back to you. It's kind of incredible. As if to say whatever questions you're looking for in him, you need to find in yourself. It's brilliant actually and true. But in addition to that M is a funny, interesting, smart genuine human being that is the best pizza eating partner.

We had three pizza's, the Quattro Stagioni - tomato sauce, mozzarella, artichokes, black olives, ham, mushrooms,the Paesana - tomato sauce, mozzarella, sausage scallions, black olives and roasted peppers and the Krotone-tomato sauce, hot soppressata, spinach, mushrooms, onion and mozzarella. These were great! But the real stars that night for me was the appetizer, the Mushroom And Fontina Cheese Bruschette. And the dessert which I can't remember the names now but the white one was one of those roll-your-eyes-back-its-so-good type desserts. I blacked out a second during the conversation falling completely in love with this cream, dreamy combo. The little cookies on the side MUST have been made from the gods. A fitting Bon Voyage for M.