But he told me that if I wasn’t comfortable sharing my faith, he understood and that I shouldn’t worry about it right now. Then before I thought about it, it slipped out that I had lied to Mom about having invited Jennifer to church when I really hadn’t. Dad got serious and said that he didn’t mind me not witnessing as much as I should but that lies were bad and that if I lied again he’d punish me. I asked him if he was going to punish me for this lie, and he said, “No, because you told me about it of your own volition, so it wouldn’t be fair.” He said no more about it. He didn’t say, like Mom would have, how hurt he was, and how I had not only grieved her but also how I had grieved Jesus who wept over Jerusalem and wanted to gather Jerusalem like a hen gathers her chicks. If it had been Mom instead of Dad, she would have hugged me and said she forgave me and then said, “Let’s just pray about this, dear.” She’d pray for a long time, so long that when I opened my eyes I would get a little dizzy and the room would spin around.

The farmer beckoned us to his house, and we went because Dad said that way up here the farmer never saw anyone, so we could not refuse his hospitality and should give him some company.

The farmer was very pleased to hear we were Americanos and he kept on saying “Peettsabourga.” So Dad figured out that he must have family in Pittsburgh and said, “Famiglia?” “Si, si,” said the farmer. They both shouted at each other as if that would make what they were saying easier to understand, but it didn’t since neither one really spoke the other’s language. The farmer gestured for us to wait, then went into the farmhouse. He came out with three glasses and a bottle of white wine with no label on it. He poured out the wine into the glasses. I looked to see what Dad would do. Mom would have tried to make the “poor dear man” understand we did not drink alcohol. But Dad pretended to sip his wine. When the farmer went back inside to get some olives and figs, Dad quickly poured out the wine into a big terra-cotta pot that had a little miniature orange tree growing in it.

“Quick, pour yours out,” he told me. So I did.

When the farmer came back, he smiled and pointed to our empty glasses.

“Buono!” he shouted.

“Si, si buono,” Dad bellowed back.