Take the Cannoli by Sarah Vowell

upon me there came from the looming, sad-eyed Messiah. The Jesus in this mosaic is huge, three times larger than any other figure inside the church. And there’s something menacing in the way he holds that tablet with theword of God on it. But his face is compassionate. With that contradictory mix of stern judgment and heart, he may as well have been wearing a tuxedo and stroking a cat and saying something like “What have I ever done to make you treat me so disrespectfully?”
    I leave the church and go for lunch. I am the only patron in a tiny family restaurant operated by Mama, Papa, Son 1, and Son 2. They glare at me as if I glow in the dark. Soon they’ll wish I glowed in the dark. The power keeps going on and off because of a thunderstorm. The sky outside is nearly black. The Muzak version of “A Whiter Shade of Pale” is playing and it flickers, too, so that every few seconds it’s dark and silent. Which is a relief, considering that the rest of the time it’s loud and the entire family have seated themselves across from me and gape without smiling. The eggplant on my plate is wonderful, but such is my desire to escape their stares that I have never chewed so fast in my life.
    How had it never hit me before? The whole point of The Godfather is not to trust anyone outside your family. And whatever I may have thought while sitting in front of my VCR, I am not actually Sicilian. I bear no resemblance to Clemenza, Tessio, or any of the heads of the Five Families. If I were a character in the film at all, I’d be one of those pain-in-the-ass innocent bystanders in the restaurant where Michael murders Sollozzo. I’m the tuba player in Moe Green’s casino. I’m that kid who rides his bike past Michael and Kay on Kay’s street in New Hampshire who yells hello and neither Michael nor Kay says hello back.
    I got sucked in by The Godfather ’s moral certainty, never quite recognizing that the other side of moral certainty is staying at home and keeping your mouth shut. Given the choice, I prefer chaos and confusion. Why live by those old-world rules? I was enamored of the movie’s family ethos without realizing that in order to make a life for myself, I needed to go off on my own. Why not tell people outside the family what you’re thinking? As I would later find out, it’s a living.

Vindictively American
    Personally, I am too vindictively American, too full of hate for the hateful aspects of this country, and too possessed by the things I love here to be too long away.
    â€”R ALPH E LLISON
    MY FRIEND E STHER B LAAUW AND I were watching the Acht Uur Journaal —Holland’s eight o’clock television news. Emphasis on “watching.” After three months at the University of Leiden, in April 1992, my Dutch vocabulary hadn’t progressed much past koffie, bier, and “My name is Sarah how are you,” words and phrases which didn’t get much broadcast journalism airplay. The screen flashed pictures of buildings on fire. The newscaster said, “Dutch Dutch Dutch Dutch Dutch Los Angeles Dutch Dutch.” I absentmindedly sighed, “Fires in southern California, what else is new?” But Esther turned her gaze from the TV set to stare at me. “What?” I asked, just as the newscaster said, “Dutch Dutch Dutch Rodney King.”
    Esther explained that a jury in Los Angeles had acquitted the fourpolice officers accused of beating Rodney King. That surprised me, having seen the video. “Now,” she said, “the whole city is on fire.” That did not surprise me, having seen the video. Four people were dead from the mayhem. I stared at the smoky pictures. But Esther watched me, glaring at my hands accusingly, as if I could throw a brick through a shop window ten thousand miles away. She told me, only half joking, “Of course you’re not going back there.”
    â€œBack where?” I