Holy Cow! Are There Any Innocents Left?

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I arrived home in West Palm Beach in August after a busy day at Bluegreen Corporation. As usual, I hit the remote to get to ESPN. I was alone in Florida working on a special project. My wife was back in Nutley.

The news I heard from the solemn young sportscaster choked me up: one of the few innocents left on the planet had said his last goodbye. Holy Cow! Another of the Greatest Generation had left.

Phil Rizzuto has gone home to his eternal reward, and life will never be the same.

I cannot possibly share all the scenes that danced across my mind as I remembered "The Scooter," who adopted Hillside, New Jersey as his home after becoming a Yankee forever.

(As some of you know, I've been crafting a new book with some astute new friends, and this poor excuse for a blog has been neglected over the last 30 days. So I still do not have the time to share all of the memories. Maybe as time goes by I will add the others.)

But, let me share the ones that bubbled up first:

I met Phil when I was a little kid in the fifties. My Dad would venture into the bowels of Newark, New Jersey once per year with some money my Mom had given him from her Graveyard Shift work at Tung Sol on Bloomfield Avenue in Bloomfield. (She sweat for the extras, Dad toiled at Andrew Jergens cosmetics factory for the necessities.) The extra in this case would be a sport jacket or suit on sale to be purchased at legendary "American Shops." This was the men's store that featured the legends as salemen. You got it -- I would stand in awe as Phil, or Yogi, or Moose Skowren would fit PFC Rocky Cervasio, my hero of a dad, with a new suit my Mom allowed him to buy. Rizzuto and Yogi were little guys, and Dad made it clear to me you didn't have to be big to be a giant. He was as much in awe as I.

During the hot summers after Phil retired from playing, I would return from playing baseball and/or football all day to find my mother in the TV room. She'd be simultaneously ironing our clothes and watching our black and white, as the likes of Mel Allen and now Phil Rizzuto would be bringing her Yankees into our modest home at 711 Belleville Avenue in Belleville. With sweat above her thin upper lip, a wet hankerchief around her neck, an ice cube-filled glass of cold water from the tap sitting on the end of the ironing board, a pack of Luckies up her left sleave of her blue Tung Sol uniform (she wore it more than she should have ... she never bought herself any of those "extras"), ... she'd loved to hear him exclaim: "Holy Cow!"

And when we might be taking a Sunday ride up around Clifton by Rizzuto-Berra Bowling Alleys, Dad would sometimes stop, we'd go in for a hot dog or soda, Phil or Yogi might be there, and afterwards in the car Dad would always comment, "Two great guys, but Phil never puts his hand in his pocket." I guess Yogi would buy the patrons a drink once in a while, while Rizzuto would be more concerned about "the bottom line." (of course, we came to discover Phil's generosity later in life to the cause of the blind.)

But, the greatest memory of Phil Rizzuto is a new one delivered to thousands by my old friend AJ Buddy Fortunato, publisher of the Italian Tribune (www.italiantribune.com ), former Jersey politician, and legendary Montclair High athlete. In Buddy's priceless dedication of his weekly paper to Phil Rizzuto on the news of his death, he told the last story of Mr. Rizzuto:

When Phil was weakening in the last months, as usual, his best friend Yogi Berra would visit him at the West Orange Nursing Home keeping Phil comfortable until his last day. Well, as Buddy writes, it seems it was Ash Wednesday and Phil, of course, did not make it to church. Yogi had, and when Rizzuto lamented his inability to honor that great Catholic tradition that day, Yogi did the following:

HE STOOD UP, SHUFFLED OVER TO HIS BED-RIDDEN TEAMMATE, TOOK OL #10 IN HIS ARMS, AND RUBBED HIS FOREHEAD AGAINST THE SCOOTER'S. YOGI THEN SAID,  "NOW YOU HAVE YOUR ASHES AND BLESSING."

Phil Rizzuto is a Hall of Famer. He is also the Godfather to one of Yogi Berra's sons.

I will never forget his child-like innocence that the wonderful Alan Sepinwall of the Star Ledger featured the week after Phil's death (www.asepinwall@starledger.com ) Yes, Rizzuto loved baseball, his country, his wife and family, the Yankees, ... and his friend Yogi. And Yogi loved Phil.

I hope we've learned from the Greatest Generation. They made it a better place for us. Let's pass along these stories of our heroes, ... so our kids can learn what's really important.

Holy cow, Phil! It won't be the same without you, but you DID make our lives more abundant when you were here. We won't cry for your leaving, ... rather we will rejoice you were here!

Joe Cervasio, an ol' fan of Phil Rizzuto from his days taking care of my Dad at American Shops in Newark.

Comments

[joe mossa]

When I was a kid i had a Lemonade stand at old hendricks Field in Belleville. Rizzuto came by and while playing in a tournament and made a point of buying a drink from me for 25 cents. I kept that cup for the longest time-So long Scooter--Joe

[Joe C.]

Joe, so sorry it took me so much time to respond.

Yes, living next to one of the great public courses in the USA, I can just see ol' Scooter teeing off in Belleville. Thanks for the great story!

And I hope my old grammar school classmate is well out there in Colorado. I will always remember your great football career at Pennsylvania Military Academy as a running back. Well deserved for a great guy who had to wait for a good doctor to give him the go-ahead to play the great American game of football. We would have been a better team at Belleville if you were permitted to play.

God bless, from your old buddy from PS #10,

Joe Cervasio