Thursday, October 31, 2013

A Little Humor in the Omaha Saga


The summer of 1960—the summer I discovered why Mother Alfred had sent me to Omaha—Sister Sweteberta told my scholastic class of eighteen that we had to “turn” our habits that summer.
         I panicked. I’d faced knives, but thread and needle were an entirely different matter.
         About fifteen years before, the sewing of an apron while in Girl Scouts had been a dismal experience. A failure. My flippant attitude about the project had incensed the leader who’d summarily dismissed me from the Scouts.


Bess Truman with the Girl Scouts

            After Sister Sweteberta gave us the news about turning our habits, I asked two friends if they’d do it for me while I did their obediences. One tablewaited in the summer refectory; the other worked in the scullery. They also used a polisher on the terrazzo floors of the four-story building. All that sounded like a leisurely summer picnic next to the ordeal of turning a habit.


Sewing Fisherman’s Wife by Anna Ancher, 1890

            To turn a habit was to make the back become the front by changing the sleeve openings, the yoke, and the frayed hem. The back of our daily habit had become shiny and threadbare from our having sat on it for two years. The long, narrow scapular of black serge we wore over the habit—back and front—would cover the shine. Turning would keep the habit whole, not holey.
         Turning was beyond my capabilities.
         My two friends thought they got the best of the deal. They actually liked to sew. Both of them had probably been great girl scouts. When the Scholastic Mistress heard my plan, she nixed it. I’d turn my own habit.
            “I don’t like sewing,” I explained.
            “It’s your habit, Sister Innocence. It’s your duty to take care of it.”
            “I’m not good at sewing.”           
            “You’ll get good.”
            “Believe me, I can’t sew no matter how much I try.”
            “If you don’t learn how to sew, you’ll never be a real woman,” she said.
            “I don’t want to be a real woman if that means sewing,” I countered. 
         She held up her right hand for silence.            
         I closed my mouth. I’d taken the vow of obedience. I’d lived it out on mission for five months with an unruly group of seventh graders. Surely turning a habit couldn’t be worse than that.


            Let me be the first to tell you: it was. That summer I had to do it all by hand because the personality of a sewing machine continued to evade me. I had so many needle pricks in my fingers and left so many drops of blood on that black serge that my friends felt sorry for me and surreptitiously helped whenever Sister Sweteberta wasn’t looking. We were downright sneaky.


            Years have passed and I’m fairly certain that letting others define us is hazardous for our emotional growth and contentment. The Scholastic Mistress defined a woman as a female who could sew. Upon leaving the convent on Christmas Eve in 1966, I discovered that many people—both men and women—defined a woman as “married.” Or, even better, “married with children.” I didn’t then and I don’t now fit those definitions.
            The truth is I’m not particularly concerned about “being a woman.” Being either male or female is of little interest to me. What is important is becoming an authentic human being. I’m gently greeting—day by day—the Oneness that lies deep down in the center of myself. I choose to let this Oneness define me.
            What I know for certain is that I never become a scout . . . or a seamstress.
            Surely Dante considered sewing one of hell’s worse torments.

Note: Next Thursday I’ll share my second year in Omaha with you. That will complete the Omaha saga!

All photographs from Wikipedia.

50 comments:

  1. My mother felt the same way--she used to bring shirts that needed a button sewn back on to me so that i would do it for her!!

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    1. Dear Fishducky, it's good to know that I'm in such fine company! Peace.

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  2. Be yourself is the way to be, if te rest don't like it, tough. I couldn't sew a thing if I tried either.

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    1. Dear Pat, it's sometimes hard to be ourselves because of peer pressure or authority, but you are so what that it's the best way to be. Peace.

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  3. Poor Dee, I totally understand as I can't sew either, nor can I knit, but for some weird reason I can both crochet and embroider. I enjoyed hearing about nuns sneaking around their obedience vows. I can imagine it would all get to be a bit much when they seemed to not make sense.

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    1. Dear Inger, like you, I can crochet--but not embroider. This winter I plan on crocheting a throw composed of squares, for each of which I'll learn a new stitch/technique.

      I'm glad you enjoy the image of nuns sneaking about! I certainly did my share of that. Peace.

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  4. I guess I'm not a real, genuine woman. I can't sew to save my life. I took 3 years of Home Ec. I always got an A in cooking and a C in sewing, and the teacher was being generous with the sewing grade. You are beautiful just the way you are.

    Love,
    Janie

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    1. P.S. I didn't know it was possible to get kicked out of Girl Scouts, but I got kicked out of Bible study when I lived in Illinois.

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    2. Dear Janie, so we're in this together--the rebels! I understand the being generous with grades. I was so inept in phy. ed that the teacher gave me Ds and she, too, was being generous. Peace.

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  5. Sewing machines have a poisonality all of their own don't they? And yes, I too am not a real woman. On so many fronts.

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    1. Dear EC, they do have a personality. I was always peddling backward. I never seemed to master peddling the right way.

      And like you I'm still not sure at all about being a real woman! Peace.

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  6. Dismissed from Girl Scouts. Priceless. A shame Scholastic mistress had no imagination. I wonder how many of your adventures my aunt had. I'm sorry I never asked. I do remember at my grandmother's funeral, I was three, I sat on the bed and watched her and a cousin, a nun from another order, exchange habits and twirl and look at themselves in the mirror in my parents' bedroom.

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    1. Dear Joanne, it is too bad that all of us think of asking questions after someone we care for has died. I'd so like to ask my mom and dad questions about their lives, but Mom died when I was 32 and Dad died when I was 39 and I didn't realize just how much their responses would have helped me.

      I so like your story about your two nun relations and their exchanging habits and twirling and looking in the mirror! I bet they giggled at themselves! What a treasured memory. Peace.

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  7. We have yet more in common, Dee! I was kicked out of the Brownies (pre-Girl Scout troop) for balking at the girlish things we were asked to do for our patches. I had older brothers who were camping and learning to start fires and making soapbox cars to race and I wanted to do that, not learn to boil an egg. I was so defiant that they asked me to leave. I love that you didn't get defeated by your inability to enjoy sewing.

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    1. Dear Kari, yes, I, too, got tired of all the "girlish" things we had to do. Like you, I wanted to learn "boy's" things--like hammering and making bird houses and starting fires and camping out. What a treat that would have been.

      I can just see you being defiant! You still are and that's why your blog is a favorite of mine. Peace.

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  8. I love sewing--quilts. I used to sew for my girls, but after they grew up, all that was over.
    Now--quilts, with the colors and patterns.

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    1. Dear Susan, I like to think of you sewing quilts. You are such a marvelous storyteller and I bet your quilts tells stories also. Peace.

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  9. My, my, being asked to leave the Girl Scouts for giving lip. Now that is something, Dee. You were a maverick from the start. Good for you!

    When I tell my children what it was like to be a girl/woman in the 50's/60's, they look at me like I must have come from another planet. We certainly were defined so much different than today. I could sew, but not because I had to, but because my mom did and it looked like fun. I have not sewn in years even though I own a super-duper, does all things, sewing machine. I really don't feel like learning it and besides, it is usually cheaper to buy something already made than to buy the material and other notions that I would need to come up with something half as nice.

    BTW, my one daughter comes over to may house to have her father sew buttons or to repair something. She knows I can do it, but her dad finds joy in helping her out. He learned to sew in the Air Force.

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    1. Dear Arleen, yes, today's young women really have no idea what life was like in the 40's/50's/and 60's. They learn about the "hippie" age, but not about what went before that and may have been part of the catalyst for the rebellion of the late 60's.

      Do you watch "Downton Abbey"? The reason I ask is because the men who take care of the "masters" do sewing in the kitchen and a couple of times the camera has shown that and one of the characters has commented about how fine the invisible stitching is. I so like the idea of your daughter appreciating her father and your husband finding joy in helping her. Peace.

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  10. Oh my goodness- getting dismissed from Girl Scouts over a sewing issue? Phew- you were probably better off not being with them. I'm glad your friends were still able to help you some. I don't sew at all anymore, by choice. What we do with our hands, or anything we do on the outside, shouldn't have one bit of input into defining who we are. It's all about what's on the inside.

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    1. Dear Shelly, yes, I agree, but it did take me a while to discover that I'm not what I do; I yam what I yam! As Popeye the Sailor would say!

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  11. This is so funny!!! I can't sew either. I can knit and crochet, but can't even whip up a hem. Wasn't kicked out of Brownies...just bored and quit. I wanted to do tomboyish things.

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    1. Dear Turquoisemoon, hems are hard! There's no "whipping them up" for me. It's labor. Did you see Kario's comments above? She, too, wanted to do tomboyish things. Peace.

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  12. I was terrible at sewing, too. In Home Ec I had to make a pencil skirt (red) and it was so bad, but I had to wear it to school one day. I did, and it fell apart as I took it off! I'll never forget how awful it was to sew. Loved the story, Dee. :-)

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    1. Dear DJan, oh I can just see that skirt falling apart! I hope you had a long slip under it. Remember those slips we used to wear?

      I so agree with you. Sewing IS "awful"! Peace.

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  13. I am a real woman, and i can't sew.
    When I was about 13, my mother decided she was going to teach me how to, using a sewing machine. You know, 13 is a bad age to start something stressful with your mother. It was a catastrophe. I don't know why i didn't burn the pajamas we made. But I knew i never wanted to do THAT again..
    Years later, when my husband-to-be and I were discussing our future marriage, we talked about sharing cooking, cleaning, laundry, even ironing (I guess we ironed back then) and we both said at the same time "but I don't sew"
    mimi
    Mimi T Boothby watercolors

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    1. Der Mimi, it would seem that you and I feel the same about the art known as "sewing." I so appreciate people who quilt and tell stories with their material and thread and needle just as you tell a story with your art. All of us--and all with different talents! Peace.

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  14. I wonder if young women today feel the same pressures to "be" something, fit a label or another person's definition that was surely true when we were young. I'd like to think that it's at least less pressure on them, but I don't know that it's true! You have such a remarkable life force around you, Dee. And from your stories I'd say it's safe to say you've lived without being tied to any specific definition except to say that you are a kind and warm, curious and interesting, giving and very capable person. That's a pretty remarkable human being! ox

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    1. of course they do! take a look at preteens, they are already dressing up like vamps. They have airbrushed models to contend with...

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    2. Dear Debra, thank you for your kind words about what defines me. I think that talking about definition would be a good thing in our schools today. I can see a really creative exercise in doing this with all sorts of activities. Wouldn't that be fun to teach! Peace.

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  15. So well written. Being a girl i also tried to learn sewing and stuff like that but unfortunately my interest couldn't developed much. I wish i had this skill too :)

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    1. Dear Kiran, thank you for stopping by. It would seem that the world over many of us--creative women all--didn't want to sew! Peace.

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  16. I'm with you, Dee, I'd rather clean house than sew, though of course I love knitting. But sewing is nevertheless a useful skill, so I did learn, just as you did, even if we both only pick up a needle out of necessity. :-)

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    1. Dear Perpetua, it would seem from these comments that many of us wouldn't agree with Sister Sweteberta's definition of a woman. I've tried knitting but didn't do well at it either. But I do really like to crochet. And yes, I can sew--out of necessity--if one of the seams comes apart on a blouse or something or a hem starts to droop! Peace.

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  17. HA HA ---that is SO me!!!!! I guess I'm not a 'real' woman because I never learned to sew and never wanted to! My sweet mother loved to sew --but her only daughter had no interest…. We are all different and we all have our own talents. I have plenty--but they don't lie in the areas of sewing/stitching/crafts/quilting, etc…. I love seeing beautiful quilts and beautiful cross stitch projects --but have no interest in doing them myself. Oh Well!!!!

    Cute post…
    Hugs,
    Betsy

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    1. Dear Betsy, you are such a talented woman truly. And you are so right that we are all different and that all of us are talented in some wonderful way. Peace.

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  18. I watched my daughter try sewing. What a mess. It's one of those things, you love it or you don't. I always loved sewing but not quilts and embroidery work. I always designed and sewed all my own dance costumes. One of my fovorite shows is "Project Runway." You can write books..... I can't.

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    1. Dear Manzanita, I would so love to see photographs of your dance costumes. Have you shown them on your blog? I also like to see a video of you dancing. Peace.

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  19. Ah Dee, I can so relate. I made a similar pact when I took home economics in high school.
    I bartered my amazing skill for being able to rip out mistake seams flawlessly for having others complete my sewing project. I never ever felt guilty about it. We just use the talents we are given.

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    1. Dear Arkansas Patti, that's it! "we just use the talents we are given." I wish I'd have thought of that when Sister Sweteberta and I exchanged viewpoints! Peace.

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  20. Truth be told.. my husband can sew better than I. When he was in high school he worked for a canvas company sewing boat covers. Luck me :)

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    1. Dear Pam, if you have time, please read the comment from Arleen--it's title is "Starting Over . . . Accepting Change . . . Maybe" and it's several comments above yours. Her husband also is a fine sewer. Peace.

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  21. My mother was a seamstress and showed me how to sew when I was a wee kid and I liked it. But I don’t think it is a “woman’s job.” My best friend’s brother in France liked to sew with his father who was a tailor. He became a tailor himself and he and his wife opened a boutique in Brussels where they were very successful. Then, as you know, most of the high fashion designers in Paris are men, like Dior, Lanvin, Yves St Laurent, and in the States there are too many men in fashion to list.

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    1. Dear Vagabonde, when you stop to think about fashion designers and tailors and other men who love to sew, then Sister Sweteberta's reasoning just doesn't stand up! Peace.

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  22. Do they even have home ec in schools anymore? We learned how to cook and sew and keep our husbands happy with our frugality, attention to detail, meeting them at the door all fresh and pretty, and not talking about our days (they expected us to be housewives). I totally get Mad Men. :)

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    1. Dear Rita, thank you so much for stopping by--that is a lovely and generous gift to me. I'm not sure about home ec in school today. My Catholic high school was so small that we didn't have home ec. I didn't learn to cook either and had to learn that in the convent--and that will provide at least one hilarious posting in the future! Peace.

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  23. Okay, I’ve caught up.

    You may not believe this, Dee, but I am almost always angry on your behalf. It’s like watching a film where I want to shout at the screen: Get Out Now!

    A competent, strong, intelligent and capable woman like the one whose experiences are written would surely never stand for these bullying tactics?

    Or is that the world has changed out of all recognition since those days?

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    1. Dear Friko, thank you for thinking of me as a competent, strong, intelligent, and capable woman back in 1960. But I really wasn't or at least I didn't see myself that way. Moreover, I felt that I'd truly been "called by God" to me a nun. It was a real vocation I thought.

      And my "superiors" kept telling me that and I had taken vows with every intention of practicing obedience and so I did what they told me to do.

      It was only a few years later, when I realized that I was going slowly insane that I knew I had to leave or I'd lose myself. Suppressing for all those years my natural bent toward rebellion took its toll finally and it took me several years after leaving the convent to recuperate and accept that I just wasn't suited to the life. And yes, for a while after leaving I became very angry also. I was immature and I thought that the nuns knew me better than I knew myself. That proved untrue. Peace.

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  24. Dee, you did give me cause to shake my head a bit and chuckle. I can't sew, either, though I have attempted to sew on occasion. Let's see, there was one of Jennifer's Halloween costumes that my sister, a great seamstress, pointed out was all done inside out just as Jennifer went out the door, and Katy. Ah, Katy, poor dear, also left Girl Scouts when her mother stapled her badges onto her sash. Sigh. She finally forgave me (I think) because she is even worse with a needle than I. Your sister nuns did find a way to help you, which makes me smile.

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    1. Dear Penny, speaking of chuckling, I chuckled when I read your two stories about Jennifer and Katy. For years, I've stapled my hems when I had no time to laboriously sew them in place. Yes, Rose Ann and Hope helped me through that "ordeal." Peace.

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