Two cousins keeping up a bingo
tradition
The ladies dropped their bingo dimes in a plastic cup and smiled at
Sam's grandsons as they got ready to call the numbers for the Tuesday
night game at Park Avenue Seniors Apartments in Burbank.
"We're all in love with those boys," Dorothy Dunn said as the other
ladies nodded in agreement. "If we were younger, we'd be chasing them,
that's for sure."
Anne Pisano looked up from her bingo card and smiled. Those boys, her
grandsons - Mike Pisano, 24, and John Brillantes, 23. Her late husband,
Sam, would have loved this scene, she thought. Loved what his grandsons
were doing in his memory.
Before he died almost two years ago, it was Sam up there calling the
Tuesday night bingo games for so many years, always joking and flirting
with the ladies wanting him to call their numbers.
And now it was his grandsons, John and Mike, calling the same bingo game
for him, joking and flirting with the same ladies.
"Our friends don't bother calling us anymore on Tuesday nights because
they know we'll be here calling bingo for grandpa," John said.
And you wonder why the ladies playing bingo over at Park Avenue Senior
Apartments love those boys.
Growing up, it was on grandpa's knee where they felt the most love and
warmth, the boys say.
It didn't matter what they wanted to talk to him about, Sam would always
smile, pat his knees and tell his grandsons to hop up. He had plenty of
time for them.
You don't forget moments like that, the boys say. Ever.
So when their grandfather's health started to fail him and he stopped
one night in the middle of calling the bingo numbers to cry a little and
tell the ladies he couldn't do it anymore, well, there was only one
thing his grandsons could do.
Give grandpa back some of that love and warmth he so freely gave them
growing up.
"After Sam died, I called the games for a couple of weeks," said Donna
Brown, manager of the complex. "Then one Tuesday night, John came in and
asked if he could call one game.
"The next week, he came back and asked if he could call all the games. I
thought, He's young. It will fizzle out, and he'll stop coming. But he
didn't."
Not only did he not stop coming, he brought along his first cousin,
Mike, who had heard what John was doing.
The boys were close growing up, but as they grew older and their
interests varied, they saw each other less and less.
Then Grandpa died, and the first cousins started thinking about all
those years sitting on his knee, laughing and carrying on.
It was time they spent more time together, they agreed. They would start
by having dinner with their grandma every Tuesday night, then go down to
the rec room to call bingo for Grandpa.
"At first, I was a little worried that the ladies might not accept them
because they don't like change, and they all loved Sam so much," Donna
said. "I shouldn't have worried. Now, they all love Sam's grandsons."
Yeah, her husband would have loved this scene Tuesday night, Anne
thought. Elsie Nelson, Julia Young and all his bingo ladies having some
holiday cake and punch ready for the boys when they came down from her
apartment after dinner.
Handing John and Mike a couple of Christmas cards with $50 in them, and
taking their turn giving the boys a hug and kiss - telling them how
their grandfather would have been so proud of them.
Then, one by one, dropping their dimes in a plastic cup and getting back
to business. Enough love. It was time for bingo.
"O-65, ladies," Mike yelled, spinning the hopper. "O-six five."
BY DENNIS MCCARTHY, Columnist
LA Daily News
