The Bad Wines...

The Mal-Vino’s

In my neighborhood growing up, one of the families that stood out the most were the Mal-Vino’s. I hyphenated their name to fool the evil googlers. In some ways, I think they’d be honored to have me describe them to you. In others, I think they might feel nonplussed. So… some way or another, I’ll keep google from pointing out the fact that I am telling you about them, as all of the Mal-Vino boys were big boys, and so were all of the Mal-Vino girls. You can see how a guy like me, in a case like this, needs to be careful.

There were four of each kind of kid, plus a mother and a father, and two sets of grandparents. They all lived in the same ranch style house in the suburbs, but as a group they had the feel of a New York Italian Catholic family- at least in my imagination.

On the boys’ side, there was (eldest to youngest) Mike, Mark, Matt and Mario. On the girls’ side, there was Marianne, Mari, Melissa and Marissa. Yes. All M’s. Hard not to notice. They actually inspired (Steve, Scott, and Sandy) us to name our dog Samson, our cats Spooky and Suzy Q, our rat Snoopy, and every pet snake we caught Slithereen.

I just had an argument with Mum over who was Marissa. The youngest, or the second youngest…

Marissa was my sister’s age. Mario was my brother’s age. They lived about fourteen or fifteen houses down our street.

Mario would have Steve and I over when we were kids. Sometimes we’d sit at their huge table and have dinner with them. They were a lot like the family in “Staying Alive”, in that everybody was a smart ass, and everybody was always getting a smack to the back of the head.

Mrs. Mal-Vino was a tall and skinny woman, with dainty, bird-like features. I remember sitting there and trying to imagine all of these kids coming out of her tiny and trim belly. It made no sense to me when I was a kid. How all of these dark-haired galoots could come out of such a skinny lady? She didn’t look the type. But apparently…

They had a decent sized yard, and a separate side yard where a primed 32 Roadster body sat on blocks. It was the Hot Rod I never saw put together. The oldest two brothers had taken off the body, sandblasted it, primed it, and then left it there. This was the yard our kick-the-can games centered around. Sometimes, we would drive Hot Wheels through the sand on the ground, and make our own tracks.

I must have been about nine the year we spent much time at the Mal-Vino’s. We played football out in the street in front of their house many evenings under the street lights. The Mal- Vino’s had enough kids to make a whole team. It very well could have been the Mal-Vino’s against the neighborhood. Even the Mal-Vino girls played. They were big-boned girls, and pretty rough in their pass rushing.

I think I learned about swearing from watching one of these girls fall down. They knew lots of words for vagina that I had never heard of.

The reason I first thought about them, was because someone made me think about the loss of family businesses. They had a paint and decorating store in town. The father ran it, the grandfather’s worked there, and when Mike and Mark were old enough, they too, sold paint and wallpaper supplies and the whole family prospered.

Big Corporations came in and they no longer exist.

I wonder what it is that supports them now?

They all got older and outgrew me. When you have a car, you don’t play football with preteen boys…

Mario grew up alongside my brother. The last time I saw him, he was on a moped and heading to Alaska to be a ski-instructor. Yes, on his moped. I heard that he made it too. That was over twenty years ago. Crap, that was twenty-eight years ago. Even on a moped… time flies.

The only real story that comes immediately to mind when thinking about the Mal-Vino’s, was the night we were playing football and the whole Mal-Vino family got into a fight- with each other!

One minute, I was running down to the mailbox and doing a button-hook, the next minute, I was watching as four dark-haired boys and four dark-haired and big-boned girls, began pounding each other with their fists, jumping on each other’s backs, pulling each other’s hair and grabbing at each other’s boobs and willy’s.

I couldn’t tell who was on whose side, either. It was like the whole family had issues built up with everyone else. There were no alliances. There were no “pacts”. There was just a free for all in the middle of the street, and I stayed out of it.

Oh I watched it alright. I mean, talk about an anthropological education!

Titties twisted, hair pulled, groins punched, eyes jabbed, skin raked with painted nails… Arm bars employed, full nelson’s, a few judo moves, a couple of faces shoved into the asphalt…

Did I mention that all four boys shared the same room, and all four girls shared a different room?

It seems that resentments were being worked out in lieu of a good nerf football game.