Memorial Day: 2025

   

                                           

 

Today in the United States of America we celebrate Memorial Day, a day devoted to honor and remember America’s veterans, especially those who gave their lives in the call of duty. I never served in the military but have always respected those who did. Today, I would like to repeat an earlier  Memorial Day post about my wife’s uncle, Silvio Gardella, who served for three years on a submarine during World War II. 

 

The post was based on Admiral I. J. Galantin’s “Take Her Deep! A Submarine against Japan in World War II.”  The book is primarily an account of the exploits of the U.S.S. Halibut from 1942 to the end of 1944. I was drawn to the book because Silvio Gardella served on the Halibut throughout those three years.

 

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, twenty-five year old Silvio decided to enlist in the Navy because he did not want to be drafted into the Army. He wound up in the submarine service because one day an officer told him and some others to “volunteer.” Silvio protested that he didn’t know how to swim, but was told that swimming would not be necessary in the submarine service.

 

He first served on U.S.S. Sculpin under then Captain Galantin who was making his final test run before getting his own ship. The Captain must have taken a liking to Silvio because at the completion of that training mission, he chose fireman second class Silvio and another seaman to join him on his new sub, the Halibut. Silvio was an extremely lucky man because on its next voyage, the Sculpin was lost.

 

There might have been times during his tour of duty that Silvio thought that his luck had run out. Admiral Galantin’s account of the Halibut’s missions off the coast of Japan shows how difficult and dangerous those missions were. Contrary to popular perceptions, the Halibut and other WWII submarines had to spend most of their time on the surface where their powerful diesel engines could attain 20 knots. But below the surface they normally could only reach two or three knots. On occasion, they could reach six knots but at that speed they would quickly drain their batteries.

 

To avoid detection from enemy ships and planes the Halibut would usually go at periscope depth during the day looking for Japanese shipping to destroy. But practically every night it would have to resurface to recharge its batteries. Even at night the moon could betray their location to enemy lookouts. Still, much of its hunting was done at night when its greater surface speed gave it an advantage.

 

These long night watches when the Halibut’s lookouts strained their eyes to detect enemy shipping and their dangerous escorts were a constant source of strain on the crew. In a very poignant passage Admiral Galantin describes how the different seamen dealt with the constant threat of danger.

 

Often as their eyes adjusted to the blackness, the torpedoman’s mate, machinist’s mate, or electrician’s mate—men like Perkins, Kelly, Black, Gardella—would find me already pacing the short space abaft the periscope shears. Five thousand miles from our own shores, talking in hushed voices as though the enemy coast had ears, how rewarding were the frank, midnight conferences, as the gulf between captain and crewman disappeared in the night. 

In the strange, unnatural life we led, in the tensions of submarine warfare deep within enemy waters, each man sought his private, personal assurance of safety and survival. What differing faith the voices in the night revealed. Some put their trust in materiel—in the fantastic equipment we had, or in the stoutness of our hull…. Bob Black, from Brooklyn, was certain that our fine crew, our careful training, were more than equal to every challenge. Still others sought assurance in the negative, in damning the enemy and denying his capabilities….

Silvio Gardella, from White Plains, New York, he of a family of sixteen children, was convinced that I knew all the tricks of our trade and would certainly outwit any Jap C. O. “Skipper, a good Italian boy like me don’t have to like it, but I can take it.”

Captain Galantin must have been moved by Silvio’s trust but he was aware of his own limitations. He concluded his nighttime reflection with these words.

 

I could give confidence in our ship and in each other, but my own support came from the Ninety-first Psalm….From frequent readings I knew it by heart.

 

I will say of Jehovah, He is my refuge and my fortress; My God, in whom I trust. For he will deliver thee from the snare of the fowler And from the deadly pestilence He will cover thee with his pinions. And under his wings shalt thou take refuge: His truth is a shield and a buckler.

 

Obviously, the Halibut completed all of its missions including a final one where the ship was almost destroyed as victory in the Pacific seemed imminent. It was detected by new Japanese equipment and subjected to a massive depth charge attack that almost ripped the ship apart 400 feet below water. Miraculously, the Halibut survived although it was so damaged that it could only limp back home with the help of another sub. When it finally got back to Pearl Harbor, the damage was so great that the ship would never dive again.

 

The end of the Halibut was not the end for Captain Galantin who went on to a distinguished career in the Navy. But it was the end for Silvio Gardella. His tour of duty was over and he was discharged from the Navy when he returned to New York. Within days he married his sweetheart, Iole. They raised a family and he went on to be a successful businessman. But he never forgot Captain Galatin, the Halibut, and his years in the submarine service. Like many others who served with their comrades in war, it would not be far from the truth to say that those years were the best of their lives.

 

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Trump's First Hundred Days

  

 

Recently there have been a number of commentaries on the first 100 days of the second Trump administration. One appeared as a front-page article in the Connecticut Post, my local newspaper. The reporter described several interviews he had done with MAGA types. It was a small sample, but he found that Trump supporters were not blind advocates and that they did have some reservations about the President. They generally supported his policies, but some had qualms about his manner and methods.

What was even more interesting was that anti-Trumpers he interviewed could not find one positive thing to say about the President. That is really blind prejudice. Last month I did a blog post on Bret Baier's interview with Elon Musk and members of his DOGE team. When I asked liberal friends to watch even 15 minutes, they refused.

I emailed the reporter and commented on the apparent difference between Trump supporters and opponents. To my surprise he sent me a lengthy reply in which he admitted that he himself could not think of one positive thing that President Trump had accomplished in his first 100 days.

Perhaps it is unfair to judge anyone by their first 100 days on the job, especially one as difficult as the Presidency. It will take months, even years, to determine the results of many of the changes that President Trump has set in motion. Nevertheless, I would like to mention some policies that I think even liberals could regard as positives.

First, let’s look at tariffs which even the generally conservative editorial page of the Wall Street Journal finds deplorable. Practically every day the Journal editors extol the virtues of free trade and explain how bad the tariffs will be for the American economy, but not once have I seen them explain why practically every other nation imposes much higher tariffs on their imports than we do. Rising economic giants like China and India place huge tariffs on their imports. Why? Isn’t it simply to protect their home industries? The French, for example, have imposed tariffs on wines for years to protect their native growers from foreign competition.

Similarly, Democrats who must oppose anything President Trump says or does must now oppose tariffs. However, the Biden administration let stand the tariffs and trade deals that Trump had imposed during his first administration. Apparently, they did not destroy the economy or cause the stock market to tank back then.

Anyway, President Trump’s new tariffs seem to have led to significant deals with the UK and China and more seem to be in the works. We will have to wait and see.

It is hard for me to imagine why liberals can’t applaud the President’s border policies. Illegal border crossings have reached an all-time low since Trump came into office a few months ago. As the old saying goes, where there is a will, there is a way. I believe that the open border policy promoted by the Biden administration and financed by massive grants to non-government agencies (NGOs), was cruel and inhumane to those attempting that arduous journey.

I also find it hard to understand why liberals object to the DOGE findings to the point where they will not even listen. Some, for example, still can’t believe that the Small Business Administration (SBA) gave away hundreds of millions to fraudsters during the pandemic, something the SBA now admits, and claims to be correcting.

What is really puzzling is how Democrats cannot support the President’s foreign policies. It used to be an axiom that no matter how fiercely opposing parties would battle on domestic issues, they would come together to support the President on foreign affairs. But no more. Ukraine is a good example. Now, we have a President who wants to end the killing. So far, it has not been as easy as he thought, but it would be easier if his efforts were supported by the opposition.

Finally, the personnel of the second Trump administration so far seem a significant improvement over the Biden team. Just look at the top three Cabinet posts. Marco Rubio, who received almost unanimous confirmation support seems to be doing an excellent job as Secretary of State. There is really no comparison between him and his predecessor Anthony Blinken, the creator of the Hunter Biden laptop hoax. Scott Bessent seems to be doing a fine job as Treasury Secretary. No one questions his qualifications or experience. From the day he was nominated as Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth has raised bitter opposition. But at least Hegseth is a civilian, and so far, his email gaffes pale in comparison with the abject withdrawal from Afghanistan orchestrated by his predecessor.

Speaking about personnel, can anyone doubt that we now have a real live President guiding the ship of state. I don’t know how he does it, but every day Trump seems to be out there making decisions, meeting with all comers from heads of state to hostile reporters. At last we know who is running the show.


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Teo Perini

My very good friend Teo Perini passed away a year ago on May 13, 2024, at the age of 89. At the time his wife, Irena, asked me to deliver the eulogy at his funeral. This is my recollection of what I said.

 

First, I would like to point out that Teo was his real name. I thought it might be short for the Italian version of Theodore, but he told me that his father preferred short names, and so he and his brothers were Geno, Teo, and Enzo. 

 

One day about fifteen years ago I first met the three brothers when they walked into our chess club at the Fairfield Senior center. Geno was a good player but lived too far away to become a regular, and Enzo did not care that much for chess, but Teo was an avid player who added Fairfield to his list of chess venues. He soon became an integral part of our small club and even would occasionally invite us to his home in Shelton for chess and pizza.

 

In 2017, I stopped driving because of poor eyesight, and when Teo heard the news, he offered to drive me back and forth every Wednesday. I readily accepted, and so, one day he picked me in his beloved old BMW. I directed him from my house along the back roads to the Senior center but after a while he took a wrong turn, and I discovered that he meant to stop at Rawley’s for a quick lunch before chess. 

 

Rawley’s is an old hot dog stand on the Post Rd. that has been a relatively unchanged fixture with its four booths in Fairfield since the 1920s. I had already had a small lunch but had a burger with a slice of tomato while he threw down two hamburgers with practically everything on them, as well as an order of fries. 

 

It was the start of a beautiful friendship as we repeated this ritual every week. On the ride and in the few minutes we spent at Rawley’s we learned about each other. Here are some of the things I learned about his remarkable story.

 

He was born in 1935 in Fiume, an Italian seaport city on the northern Adriatic coast. As a child he grew up in a war zone as WWII raged. He remembered seeing bombs dropping on the port, and booby traps scattered along the roads. After the war, Fiume became part of Yugoslavia ruled by communists under Marshal Tito. Now it is part of Croatia. 

 

Soon his father decided to leave Fiume and migrate to Italy where the family was interned in refugee camps. Eventually, they left for America but for some reason Teo had to be left behind in one of these camps. He remembered what it was like to go without food for three days until he and a buddy got their hands on a pound of spaghetti that they devoured in one sitting. On the other hand, he somehow managed to ride a motorcycle all over Italy while waiting to join the family in Bridgeport.

 

When he finally got to America, he had nothing but the carpentry skills he had learned in school. He found work with an Italian construction company but after a couple of years, he decided to branch out on his own. It was a good time to be a builder in Connecticut, and Perini Construction would become one of the largest builders in Fairfield County. He loved building and often as we drove to chess, he would detour to proudly show me his work. He did everything from additions on single family homes to condominium complexes.

 

His likes extended to more than building. He loved ballroom dancing with his beautiful wife Irena. They even traveled to Vienna to waltz away one New Year’s Eve. Travel was also one of his loves, and the year before he died, he was thinking of a round the world cruise. He was fluent in Italian, Croatian, and could get by in other Slavic languages. He was our translator when Serbians or Russians dropped by for chess.

 

He also loved Grand Opera especially in person, and he and Irena frequented New York’s Metropolitan. But he was no highbrow. Wrestling was his favorite TV fare. He did not understand American sports like baseball, football, and basketball, but did love to watch tennis on TV. 

 

Teo loved to eat, drink wine, and entertain. Even though he loved dining out, he loved to cook and the back porch on the home he built himself in Shelton was the scene of constant gatherings.

He loved his wife Irena, herself an immigrant from Belarus, and his two children by previous marriages. I could tell by the way he talked with them on the phone while we sat at Rawleys. He had many friends both here and abroad and he seemed to be in constant touch with them. I was fortunate to become one of them.

 

There is an old saying: 

 

                  TO LIVE LIFE YOU MUST LOVE IT

                      AND TO LOVE LIFE YOU MUST LIVE IT

 

Teo loved life and he loved to live it.

 

Arrivederci Teo.

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Lilac Time

I've been meaning to write about President Trump, the Pope, and tariffs but the April showers have brought May flowers, and my brother Robert DeStefano has sent me another of his nature poems. Last week his Dandelion poem was well received, and so here is his Ode to the fragrant Lilac with an explanation appended. *                                                     

Syringa vulgaris

Lilac

who 

endowed you with

such beauty

who

perfumed your flowers

made you a

delight

for the eye

Lilac

Syringa vulgaris

vulgaris?

I

cannot imagine Spring without the

Lilac

May

would never be

May

without the

Lilac

Syringa

nimble nymph

of the forest

pursued by

Pan

loved by this

man

 

           

At the beginning of May, I begin to look for Lilac flower buds on my Lilac bushes.  I know I will soon be treated with the distinct lilac fragrance.  I am attracted to those deep purple flowers like a bee searching for nectar.  There are so many different fragrant chemicals produced by plants.  One of the Lilac’s chemicals is a hydrocarbon known as beta-ocimene which belongs to a class of chemicals known as acyclic terpenes. The sweet smell of citronella, eucalyptus, and many other flowers is due to beta-ocimene.  This molecule in the presence of other molecules produces a distinct fragrance.

  

            Syringa is the genus name of the Lilac.  In Greek mythology, Pan, the god of fields and forests, fell in love with the nymph, Syringa.  She ran from him and eventually turned herself into a Lilac bush.  Pan stopped by the bush and made the first panpipe from the wood of the Lilac.

  

            The Lilac appears in Walt Whitman’s poem, “When Lilacs in the Dooryard Bloom’d.”   Here the Lilac represents a symbol of life after the death of President Abraham Lincoln.

            I experimented with making shampoo using water from the deep well at my little log cabin in the Berkshires. I first began by giving a bottle of my water, EAU, to some of my AP Biology students at the end of the year. I told them the wine bottle filled with water was magical so they should only drink it on a special occasion.  After 15 years, some of those students still have the unopened bottle in a refrigerator.  I then decided to use the water to make shampoo.  I purchased various essential oils from a commune cult located in New Mexico. The cult members gather thousands of flowers and extract oils from them.  A few drops in a liter of water are all that is necessary to make water fragrant.  I used Dr. Bonner's sulfur-free, unscented castile soap and a pinch of Himalayan sea salt to provide the minerals needed to make a lather.  I called the soap EAU-POO.  I persuaded one of my students, a beautiful girl with beautiful blond hair, to try the EAU-POO.  When she came to class the next day, she explained that she used the EAU-POO and twirled her beautiful hair. She laughed and said, “EAU-POO, look what it can do for you.”

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*Robert DeStefano's nature poems and other writings can be found on Amazon.