26 REDS & A BOTTLE OF WINE

It’s always difficult to hear bad things about your loved ones.

Imagine you were Hitler’s nephew. You’re Axel Hitler, you were born in Frankfurt in 1953 and you just found out way no one talks about your uncle. That’s gotta hit you like a ton of bricks and it’s going to make high school suck. There’s nothing to do but change your name to Boba Fett and say you’re adopted and your really father is James Bond.

Let’s reel it back a bit, make it more interesting. Sure, there are thousands of kids out there who’s father or mother is locked up. Many of them for doing pretty horrible things. But most of those kids are pretty horrible too and my whole point falls apart if for you getting locked up is “just something that happens”.

So let’s raise the stakes a little. Let’s say you’re the only daughter of a single mother and when you’re twelve your mom sits you down and tells you that your father is the head of the Gambino crime family and a murderer and in now living in a metal shoebox in Virginia. “The good news is your dad is very safe. The bad news is so are the guys who testified against him.” That’s an ‘ummm, okay…” moment if I ever heard one. I suppose if he was still the head of a major crime syndicate then it might be kind of cool. No one fucks with you and you get your trashed picked up everyday, fuck that twice a week bullshit. In the end however you gotta sit yourself down and decide how comfortable you are with that legacy.

When I was in the seventh grade there was a girl in my school whose father was sentenced to 50 years to life in prison along with John Gotti’s brother and two other co-defendants. After the shock and the self-piety there has got to be a moment where you own it. You either say “Those bastards took my daddy from me and I’ll never forgive them for it.” Or “You play you pay. My dad knew the risks and he gambled and lost.” Sometimes I wonder about that girl. Where she is and how she ended up dealing with it. Here I am, seven or eight little lifetimes later and he’s still sitting in Dannemora playing pinochle with the son of Sam.

My grandfather was a great guy. Whatever his problems were I was unaware of them. Whatever his faults, he never showed them to me. All I know is that when he took the family to the Villa Roma over winter vacation he always tipped the staff well. He always tipped everyone. My Grandfather was a great tipper.