I’m in the final days of editing the final episode of season 2 – premiering in January – of Dream of Italy on PBS. This one means more to me than anything I have done or will do professionally because it is about how my ancestral hometown in Italy – Castelvetere sul Calore – a place has captured my heart since I was a child, before I ever saw it and believed it exists. As I wrote a few months ago, Castelvetere has always been a place of miracles and mystery for my family.
And this has never been more true than this year when my mother, who has stage 4 bladder cancer, and my father made the trip to Italy to film with me! (In the photo above, we’re walking int he procession of the Madonna delle Grazie a- a lady of miracles!) As I wrote in a Mother’s Day tribute, I didn’t think my mother could ever return to Italy, just her being alive is a huge miracle. In that piece, I told you about how she always turns lemons into lemonade…
And she’s turned her unused medical tubes into gorgeous necklaces called Tubes of Life. They are finally available! Part of the proceeds of each necklace will be donated to support the bladder cancer research of my mother’s incredible doctor and friend Dr. Jonathan E. Rosenberg at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. We can ship in time for Christmas, and these make for a unique gift, especially for medical professionals, though many don’t realize these are medical tubes!
As I’ve mentioned, in the past, I haven’t shared a lot of my personal stories, this episode, these articles on our miracles, these Tubes of Life are as close to my heart as you can get!