The Fabulous Birthday Boys

Celebrating Birthdays 3 and 43

Also see:
Return of the Birthday Boys (2007)
The Birthday Boys (2006)
It Was 9 Hours Ago Today (2005)

Happy 70th Birthday

Today would have been dad's 70th birthday. Here's a picture of dad on his 6th birthday -- January 6th, 1944.

click image to enlarge

Happy 2nd Birthday Joey Altobelli

Cousin Harry Altobello's Video Belated Birthday Card

Also see: Happy 4th Birthday Michael Altobelli

Little Gram Celebrates Birthday 105!

Today we celebrated my great grandmother's 105th birthday. Yes, you read correctly, she's 105! Little Gram is a point in her life where she does not want anymore presents. All she wants is to be closer to God. So, our friend, Monsignor Michael Mannion, celebrated a mass in her honor at The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. Grandma loved her present.

Little Gram surrounded by her family.

Big Gram and her mother Little Gram

Return of the Birthday Boys

Celebrating Birthdays 2 and 42

Yesterday my boy Joe and I celebrated our 2nd and 42nd birthdays. Other people celebrating December 2nd birthdays include: my favorite Martian, Ray Walston, my favorite newscaster, Stone Phillips, my favorite Asian actress, Lucy Lui, my favorite Jewish comedienne, Sarah Silverman, my favorite US secretary of state, Alexander Haig, my favorite uncle, Chuck Pollander, and my favorite white trash ho, Britney Spears.




Also see: The Birthday Boys and It Was 9 Hours Ago Today.

The Birthday Boys

Celebrating Birthdays 1 and 41

Happy 3rd Birthday, Michael

Blowing Out Candles with Authority!

Earlier today I took Michael to his very first Phillies game. Phillies beat the Marlins 11-5.

Happy Birthday Dr. King

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

Listen/Download
Mr. Fingers - Can You Feel It (Martin Luther King Mix)
John Coltrane - Alabama - Coltrane composed this for the four young African-American girls who died in a 1963 Birmingham church bombing. This unfortunate attack happened directly after the August 28, 1963 march on Washington and King's "I Have A Dream" speech.

Clean living pays off with 103 years

My great-grandmother, Mary Ferrante (aka Little Gram) turned 103 years old this past Thursday, December 8th. The following is an Gloucester County Times article written about her.

Little Gram - age 12

Little Gram - age 102

written by Bob Shryock
Mary Ferrante may not be the oldest resident of Gloucester County, but she may be the oldest who still cleans the house, cooks, washes and irons her clothes, maintains two residences, and has no major health problems.

Widowed for 61 years and the mother of four children who are in their 80's, Mary will celebrate her 103rd birthday on Thursday (Dec 8).

"We have nothing special planned," says Franklin Township resident Pauline Villa, a granddaughter with whom Mary lives with five days a week. "We'll take her to lunch. She loves grilled cheese sandwiches."

Born near Corleone, Sicily in 1902 and one of six siblings, Mary Taormina immigrated to the Unites States when she was three. All but one sibling lived into their 80s and 90s.

After settling first in New York City, she moved to Youngstown, Ohio, where her father, Francesco, was a projectionist for Warner Brothers. Francesco died of lung disease in the 1940s, but Mary's mother, Josephine, lived until she was 99.

Mary's husband, Frank Ferrante, a contractor, died in a 1944 accident soon after they moved to Pennsauken and she never remarried. All four of their children are living; Angelina Lorren (North Carolina), Josephine Endner (Sicklerville, NJ), Jim Ferrante (Guam), and Frank Ferrante (Florida). She has eight grandchildren, twenty-two (22) great-grandchildren, and twenty-eight (28) great-great grandchildren. Mary's extended family numbers close to 300.

Mary worked in the alterations department of Strawbridge & Clothier in Cherry Hill, NJ until she was 80.

After spending five days a week in her granddaughter's home, Mary lives in Sicklerville on weekends.

"She is in excellent health," says Pauline, while her kitchen was being cleaned by her grandmother. "She's fantastic, she's never had major health problems. I think it's because she has always eaten well, plenty of fruits, vegetables, and bread. And she'll tell you she has not had any alcohol since her brother's 1914 wedding, never smoked, and never cursed. Her whole world has been her family."

Always busy around her homes, Mary is an excellent cook whose specialty, not surprisingly, is making spaghetti sauce and meatballs from scratch.

"She lives a quiet, simplistic life," Pauline says. "She helps make the world a better place."

Click this image to enlarge Mary's descendant tree.

To print out Mary's descendant tree click here.

It Was 9 Hours Ago Today

It was 9 hours ago today that my second son, Joseph Giovanni Altobelli entered this thing called life. In other words, at 9:15 this morning Joey was born. If you read my earlier post you'll know that forty years ago today I was born. Wow, I never thought turing 40 would be so cool.

The two birthday boys





For additional photographs and a side-by-side
Joey vs. his older brother Michael comparison click here.

It Was 40 Years Ago Today

contributed by my mom, Pauline Villa
There was once a time when I heard the expression “forty years ago today…” it meant eons ago, a time in long lost history, an era when everything seemed so pre-historic. Well here I am recounting something that happened in my life “forty years ago today…” and it seems like just yesterday, a blip on the screen of life.

December 2, 1965 I was a young and a very pregnant woman waiting the birth of my first child, gender unknown. My husband, Don, and I expected to be parents a week earlier, Thanksgiving Day. After that day when I did not go into labor we settled into a strange lethargy. We just became resigned that when it was time, it was time. And whenever it would happen, it would happen.

The morning of Dec. 2, 1965 was a glorious day. It was sunny and warm. So warm that I didn’t even wear a coat or jacket to go to my weekly obstetric visit which was in walking distance from our apartment on Orthodox Street in the Frankford section of Philadelphia.

The doctor’s office was full of women who were in various stages of gestation. There was one woman in particular who exhibited great discomfort. I felt so sorry for her as I watched her try find some relief sitting on a small, hard folding chair that the nurses had brought out for additional seating, that I offered her my more comfortable, soft cushioned chair. Soon she went in for her exam. Not too long after the OB doctor, Dr. Kennedy rushed out the front door.

The nurse came out into the waiting room and announced that it would be awhile before we would be able to see the doctor so she suggested we come back at a later time that day.

I was still feeling euphoric about my situation. I could not imagine that soon I would be giving birth. I was also relieved that finally I did not have to be concerned about my weight! All during my pregnancy the nurse in the doctor’s office scolded and chided me for every ounce I gained. I was terrified of her and therefore watch every morsel I consumed. But not this day. I was feeling too good to let anything keep me from enjoying such a beautiful, warm December day.

The doctor’s office was just a few blocks away from the bustling, harried shopping district of Frankford Avenue. I leisurely walk there and enjoyed window shopping and treated myself to an, up to this point forbidden butter pecan ice cream cone – the best I had ever eaten! Calories were finally no longer a concern.

I returned to the doctor’s office and patiently waited while other women went in and came out.

Around four o’clock I met with Dr. Kennedy and he could not believe I was still holding on to that baby. After an exam he announced that I was at least 5 centimeters. Now to those of you who are uninformed that means “Here comes the baby ANY SECOND NOW!!!” He told me I had to get to the hospital IMMEDIATELY. My only option was to walk the three blocks from his office to Frankford Hospital by myself!

Now at age 22 I was scared, big time. I had to walk to the hospital alone with nothing but this little thing moving inside of me to give me strength. I remember rubbing my stomach as I lumbered along and saying out loud “Well, little one, we are both about to experience a great adventure!”

At the hospital I went to Admissions. The clerk asked why I was there. My reply – “To have my baby”. She look behind me for my husband or relatives and was shocked when I told her I was “just me and my baby.”

From that moment on was just a flurry of activity. I was prepped, shuttled into a wheel chair, sent up to delivery and then had to wait and wait and wait.

After about an hour or so my “water broke”. Again, for the uninformed it means the poor mother-to-be then knows exactly what it feels like to need a diaper. What a cold, wet mess it was.

Oh, my God! Soon after I experienced PAIN! Yes, GREAT PAIN! No amount of screaming, pleading, bargaining, would cajole the cold, cruel nurses who periodically looked in on me to do SOMETHING, ANYTHING to put an end to the torture.

It did finally come to an end. Thank God. I was wheeled into delivery and 7:34 on Dec. 2, forty years ago today Paul Altobell uttered his first, audible sounds and they have never stopped!

Where did the years go? Who knows? How does one become a young mother and then suddenly a grandmother? Today, 40 years after his birth, Paul will be experiencing the birth of this third child. While this wonderful event takes place I will be watching over his two other children, Rachel, 11 years and Michael, 2 and a half. I will see in them my sons eyes, smile, quirks, laugh, qualities. I will see in them all the wonderful things I saw as I walked from Dr. Kennedy’s office to Frankford Hospital forty years ago today. And I will reaffirm that we have and we are experiencing a great adventure that will continue as long as we are Mother and Son.

Happy Birthday Paul!
Love, Mom