”No One To Cover the Fig Tree” I am sure for most second generation Italian American children who grew up in the 40’s, 50’s and 60’s there was a definite distinction between us and them. We were Italians, they were everybody else, the Irish, the Germans, the Poles, they were Americans. I was well into my adulthood before I realized I was an American. I had been born American and I lived here all my life but American people who ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on mushy white bread. I had no animosity towards them, it’s just I thought ours was a better way with our bread man, egg man, javelle man, vegetable man, the Chicken man, to name a few of the peddlers who came to our neighborhoods. We knew them, they knew us. Americans went to the A & P. It amazed me that some friends and classmates on Thanksgiving and Christmas ate only turkey and stuffing, potatoes and cranberry sauce. We had turkey, but after antipasto, soup, lasagna, meatballs and salad. In case someone came in ...