St. Anthony, St. Anthony, please come around…

There’s a traditional Italian American prayer, “St. Anthony, St. Anthony, please come around, something is lost and cannot be found.” St. Anthony is commonly prayed to find lost objects.

How utterly appropriate that I make my first trip to Sicily, the place my grandparents immigrated from on St. Anthony’s feast day. I am in the airport as we speak on the way to my ancestral lands for the first time.

As a member of the Italian diaspora, whose family assimilated into American culture, who lost the language, lost connection to our land, our homes, (never the food!) but even some family, and never went back, how appropriate that the saint who helps find what is lost is bringing me back home on his day.

I just know I’m going to be crying this whole trip. Reclaiming everything that was lost but has always lived inside of me.

As I became older I realized that the parts of me with time blindness, who is always late, always dilly dallying, always in trouble for dragging my feet… this was just the slow pace of my ancestors inside of my body… il dolce far niente, the sweetness of doing nothing. Piano, piano, one step at a time. And la vita lenta, the slow life.

The part of me that was always psychic and always misunderstood for it… was transformed when I reconnected with Italian medico-magical cures, mediumship and channeled psychic healing, the traditional magic of my ancestors.

I literally cannot wait for the reclamation that I know I’m going to experience being on this land for the first time, making cheese and bread and rosaries in the traditional way, hiking Mt Etna, being on the land where the old gods were worshipped. 📿🥖🧀🍝🧄🍅

We say, Ogni lasciata è persa, meaning everything left is lost. It is said to encourage you to take a chance, to seize the moment and the opportunity before it is lost, to live without regret.

Stay tuned and thank you St Anthony. I once was lost…