THE FOURTY EIGHT HOURS WITH ALDO "COMPRESSED VISITS"

Missy's Notes and Quotes from "In the Name of Gucci," a memoir by Patricia Gucci.

Many children find themselves outside of marriage and awaiting visits from a parent. Patricia Gucci was one of those children, because her mother Bruna Palombo was a Mistress, set up first to live in England.  Aldo Gucci, a long married man who Kept Bruna visited them about once a month for a weekend.  Patricia calls these visits "compressed."

Patricia says no sooner he came through the door, her mother would start complaining about her and she would be banished to her bedroom. (133)  She realized in adulthood that her mother was in seclusion for weeks and had a lot to talk to him about.  "She rants, vents, they have a fight and reconcile all in forty-eight hours."  This was their pattern, but finally he would relax and Bruna would spoil him.  She "nurtured him and gave him safe harbor."

"He'd leave and the days were dark. Without his affection, my mother withered like an unattended plant." (136)

Eventually so that Bruna could travel with Aldo, Patricia was put into a boarding school where she found herself with "lots of kindred spirits." She loved it. (137)  When the family moved back to Rome in 1973, Patricia was heartbroken. (149)

 
When Patricia was ten years old, Bruna finally told her, "Your father has a wife in Italy and three sons," and admitted she wasn't married to him. (151)


*** Are you the child of a Mistress? We'd like to hear your story.