Zio Peter

Manu, being Italian has all manner of relatives and near relatives in and around the construction business. His Zio Gino is a house painter, Gino's longtime partner is a master plasterer, there are distant in-laws who manufacture windows, and most importantly there is his Zio Peter, who is a plumber. If we're to have any hope at all of finishing the first floor near our targeted budget, we absolutely need dear Peter to give us a hand. The thing is Peter is now retired and while he often takes on small contracts, he does so begrudgingly and only if they are to be executed within a stones throw of his bungalow. There lies the rub. For the Tall House is a good twenty minutes drive from Zio Peter's and certainly way, way out of his comfort zone. For Peter lives in The Paese, the Italian part of town where stone lions greet you at the entrances of white bricked triplexes and where salciccia are still lovingly made in the cantina and where il vino (or some semblance there of) is still brewed in il garage. Interestingly, Peter was able to leave, at the tender age of 12, his tiny native Calabrian village and set forth alone to a better life, an ocean away, in the New World. But he is now loath to set foot but a single block outside of his neighbourhood. 

Peter is a whiz with his hands but tends to shoot off at the mouth far too often and because of this is the subject of some ridicule from The Famiglia. But despite this or perhaps because of it, he is dearly loved and forever the subject of family chatter.

Now, being Italian is governed by rules of behaviour that even after eleven years of communal living (and six years of marriage) escape me. Great and everlasting offence has been taken because an aunt did not suitably appreciate a particular dish of pasta. And people have been written out of wills for not saying goodbye with the proper etiquette. But the most cardinal of rules remains: "thou shalt always help any family member in need". The fact that Peter has chosen to ignore this rule has caused a modicum of tension between Peter and his sister, my mother in law. But Peter is staying put and no amount of begging or cajoling will change his mind.

Zio Peter though, has sorely underestimated the brilliance that is Manu. Like a hunter methodically setting a trap for his prey, Manu has patiently been laying the groundwork for poor Peter to have no choice but install the first floor plumbing in The Tall House. For Peter's downfall is simple: its not the love of money (god knows we've offered!) but the art of the DEAL. Ever since I've known him Peter has been selling used bicycles, tires, scrap metal or plumbing parts all for his sole enjoyment rather than for the additional income. And so one day when Manu had managed to lure his uncle to the Tall House, Peter noticed we had a whole bathroom suite to sell that was barely 10 years old(!). Well, kryptonite comes in various shapes and sizes and in Peter's case it has taken on the appearance of a Kohler toilet. For Peter is in the process of brokering a deal to sell the whole set. Manu, playing dumb, has told him that he wants Peter to take care of the transaction. Peter will then pocket the money which Manu will of course refuse to take and then Badabing! Under the sacred code of Italian ethics Peter will owe Manu, Big Time. And voila, without knowing what hit him, Peter is now our plumber. 

Grazie carissimo Pietro.