Joe’s place
is the restaurant that my great grandparents opened in Nashville Tennessee after emigrating there from Italy in the 1920′s. I only just found out about Joe’s place recently. The death of my great uncle in July caused a veritable history vault to creak open.

Uncle Bernie lived in my great grandparents house and he kept it unchanged since the time that they lived there. He was nostalgic and eccentric, and got on my nerves like crazy and I miss him like crazy.

Combing through the heirlooms and relics of my family and ancestors, we came across 10k in bills from the 1950′s and 1960′s along with a few handguns and a shotgun.

The guns found a home in the gun safe at Chet Atkins former house (his daughter’s been my aunts bff since high school) and the cash found a home in the bank.

My mind is still slowly wrapping around the events that continue to unfold in that city in my home state, and at some point, I hope to translate all the emotions that are surfacing into something worthy and productive. Hopefully, I can get to that happy place.

Originally uploaded by rach!