My father’s heroes were also mine. We watched all of Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Westerns together and both agreed that the best was “Il Buono, il Brutto, il Cattivo,” “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.” We were also avid fans of American Westerns such as “Fort Apache”, “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon” and “True Grit,” all of them starring John Wayne, which were broadcast on Italian TV, dubbed, every Saturday night at eight o’ clock. That is how my father wished to live his life, not as a spectator but rather as a leading man in a movie like Clint Eastwood or Charles Bronson. His showmanship was contrary to my introspectiveness. I was his silent sidekick who didn’t mind having the spotlight shifted from me in order to grant him center stage.

I was ten years old when he shared with me his love for boxing by letting me watch Muhammad Ali fight Joe Frazier at Madison Square Garden on our little black and white television set.

“Susan, alza il volume!” My father ordered me to turn up the volume. I turned the metal knob as high as my ears could stand it. Our TV sat on a swiveling table so we could turn it according to the antennae’s reception. Luckily that night the match came in less fuzzy than usual.

“Balla, balla. Non smettere di ballare!” “Don’t stop dancing! Don’t stop dancing!” my father yelled from the middle of the living room at Muhammad Ali as if he were his trainer in the ring. The Italian announcer was translating the American sportscaster’s words. He sounded subdued compared to the cries of the crowd around the ring as their heads bopped up and down.

I jumped on the back of the couch and dangled my legs over my father’s shoulders, our eyes transfixed by what was unfolding on the screen. Both fighters were in white shorts but you could definitely tell them apart. Ali was the Dancer, always on his toes, never stopping and scoring with his left. And he was a master at blocking Smokin’ Joe’s punches. Still dancing. Frazier was more angled in his approach to Ali, allowing only slanting shots to his face.

My father was too absorbed by the match to realize I was now fidgeting with his hair. I took a break from the match and started playing hairdresser, parting it to the right, then to the left as if he were my Ken doll. If it had been any other time he would have swatted me away like a fly, but now he looked like he was about to jump into the television set. Ali finally won the fight that night, and the magic for me was over. He came back to reality and I was banished from the couch until the next boxing match or John Wayne movie.

He also took great pleasure in buying fine tailored suits, silk shirts and Bruno Magli shoes even when he was a young struggling actor and didn’t have a lira to his name. He got riled up if the pleats in his trousers were not straight enough and if they didn’t fall on the top of his shoes with enough effortless elegance. He believed in his shoes always being well polished.

“You should be able to see your reflection in them,” he used to say.

I remember he was a regular at Dante’s Bar in Piazza San Babila in Milano. On Sundays he would take me for a ride in his silver Corvair and stop for a Campari for himself and a Coke with a lemon wedge for me.

Having an American car in the 70’s in Italy attracted a daily crowd of onlookers that were the equivalent to the paparazzi. My father savored the adulation of strangers and seized every opportunity to speak with exaggerated pride about his American car and himself. He made sure he parked his Corvair right outside of the bar and opened the car door with his Muratti White dangling from the corner of his mouth and the lighter in his hand that would suddenly appear like a magic trick. This was a ritual easily done with his eyes shut, regularly performed in front of me and the rest of the world. He liked being watched. Every gesture, every glance or movement was of histrionic nature. He was the actor and I was his loyal spectator.

His gold lighter was always at the ready like a gun in a holster waiting for the killer draw. Click…click…puff… click. That’s all it took, one click to open the top of the lighter with his thumb, the next to brush it against the barrel to ignite, a slight pause for a quick drag and the last one for his index finger to shut the lid as his hand slid into his right pocket.

“Buon Giorno, Signor Vinciotti!” Dante himself would come out to greet him and stand around the car a bit while onlookers approached to get a closer glimpse of the Corvair with the red leather interior.

I trailed a few steps behind as we walked into the bar, our drinks already waiting for us at the counter. The bartender was an elderly man whose head had the shape of a watermelon. The skin on his face was almost translucent, showing tiny red and purple veins intersecting like a road map. At the very end of the counter was the cash register where a buxom brunette named Natalee sat behind a tall stool. She liked to come around the counter to offer me Amarena cherries covered in dark chocolate.

I melted the chocolate in my mouth and then spit out the cherry part hoping she didn’t see me do it. She never noticed or cared and by the time we were done with our drinks, the white napkin my glass was resting on was covered with little chunks of mangled cherry pulp. The flickering of her long hair, side to side, emphasized Natalee’s appreciation for my father’s flirtatious banter.

I put all the mashed cherries in my mouth and wondered what it would be like to have a mouthful of hot blood like the heavyweight fighters in the ring my dad and I watched on TV. Would it taste like warm chocolate?

I sat at the bar and looked down at my feet that hovered above the floor without touching. I was wearing blue shoes with two diamond shaped holes and ankle straps. They were my favorite. A drop of cherry juice fell out of my mouth and soaked into my white socks.

My father finished his drink and left money on the counter. I was relieved he didn’t notice the red lines on my legs that slowly made their way down my ankles.

“You love your papá, don’t you?” he said.

I nodded.

“Let’s go for a ride.”

He put his arm around me and we walked out the door. This time in unison, no longer trailing behind him hanging on to his jacket as his minion, but as his accomplice. We were Clint Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef. The Good and The Bad. Blondie and Angel Eyes. I would take any part in his movie.