Giuseppe was one son of Mike at Mike & Sons Pork Store on Flatlands Avenue. Along with many scraps and slices of meat and cheese, his finger had been severed by the meat slicer. It was a finger that was hard to ignore as a child – the pointer. In its absence – an uncomfortable invisible void forced your eyes to linger on the lost digit, desperately hoping for it to reappear. Mike was dark Sicilian, his fury eyebrows black cowering caterpillars over his dark eyes. He would reach down to hand me and my sister lollipops tasting of watermelon and cream, their opposing flavors jarring. My young hand would close around the pops as I tried to not gaze down at his missing extremity.

Then, I’d lick my lolly and stare through the glass case watching the thinly sliced meat and cheese drop onto wax paper from a tight rift between the stored cellophane and Boars Head packages. I’d clench my teeth hoping a finger wouldn’t join the heaping pile of sustenance. Giuseppe would reach across the counter with a delicate cut of meat dangling from his available fingers and offer it to my father, who would gobble the thin sliced gabagool, satisfied.

Meat hooks swayed from the ceiling doting pigs and other obscured animals. They were far from eye level and felt distant enough to not scare me. Near, were the cans of tomato sauce, the bread crumbs and breadsticks, olives and fresh mozzarella. My sister’s hand, her golden blonde head and buck-toothed grin. My own body in its glorious infancy, my dad’s legs and hands. His left, also with a damaged pointer  – wounded, but not missing.

My father immigrated from Umbria to Brooklyn in the 1950s. Leaving his family via train to eventually board a boat to America, he was inconsolable and opened the window and attempted to climb out. When his mother slammed the window shut, it came down hard on his finger and his blood poured everywhere, illustrating the migration of our blood line, as the locomotive careened towards the sea.

At home in the 90s, we’d slice sesame-seeded Italian bread and lay the cold cuts from Mike & Sons across the pillowy dough. A tradition of salt and flour; of fingers, some maimed, delivering fare.