Such being the case, the procurement of a suitable mate for Giancarlo had long been the subject of considerable deliberation and debate.With the passage of time, the discussions and telephone calls and whispers behind backs had taken on a greater sense of urgency, lately approaching something close to outright alarm. True, Giancarlo was still very much in the prime of his life, but he was teetering on the brink of spending his remaining years in permanent bachelorhood. Left to his own devices, he might very well stumble over the edge of the precipice and fall into the clutches of that dread fate.

Something had to be done.

And so it was that whenever an opportunity presented itself, all efforts were made to foist upon Giancarlo a woman it was hoped might be capable of helping him to finally find the answers and settle down once and for all. Despite the careful vetting of potential candidates, none to date had succeeded in ensnaring his heart.This long run of failure was a source of great consternation to all concerned, but they remained nonetheless undaunted in their cause.

Giancarlo was of course quite aware of the machinations going on all about him.Though he found it tiresome at times, he was not completely without gratitude for them.There was, he understood, a certain wisdom in the attempts of his friends and relatives to guide him toward a life of matrimony, for in truth he felt no particular resistance to it. Deep inside, though, he also knew that, at least for the time being, contentment lay down some other path that had yet to reveal itself to him, if indeed it ever would. Until it did, he could only wait. Meantime, he accepted these matchmaking efforts on his behalf with stoic forbearance, as he did that afternoon at the annual Fourth of July cookout at the home of Anthony and Celeste.

Giancarlo waited until late in the afternoon to make his appearance at the festivities. He had guessed, quite rightly, that the patio area around the swimming pool in Anthony’s backyard would be a frying pan earlier in the day. Sure enough, by the time he arrived at the house, many of the adults and all of the kids had already changed into their swimsuits and jumped into the water to cool off.There was talk and laughter and splashing and fathers tossing kids into the air while mothers pleaded with children to please be more careful and not run around the edge of the pool. As if this din was not enough, the music of John Philip Sousa, George M. Cohan, and others blared out from speakers set up in the living room windows inside the house. It was an appropriately raucous affair.