Being "Scolded" in Washington, D. C.

Today it’s back to Dayton in March of 1967. By then, I’d worked at Pflaum Publishing for nearly two months. As each day passed, I discovered anew how to engage in the give-and-take of conversation.

Sister Mary Dennis—the Benedictine nun who’d recommended me for an editing position after I’d left the convent—was working on her doctorate at Catholic University in Washington, D. C. She now invited me to visit her.

I have no memory of whether the details of travel seemed daunting. Nor do I remember whether, upon my arrival at the Washington airport, I worried about how to get to her residence hall at Catholic University. Did she meet me at the airport?

All I remember of sightseeing is that on Saturday we visited Georgetown and ate in the paved back garden of a restaurant that featured sculptures. What else did we see? Did I tour the campus? That’s all been lost to me.

The Old Stone House, built in 1765,

is one of the oldest buildings in Washington, D. C.

What I do remember is that on Sunday morning I met several of her nun friends who were studying for graduate degrees. They were in their late twenties and early thirties—eager to learn, excited about the Second Vatican Council that had convened in Rome in October 1962 and concluded in December 1965.

Wikipedia describes the outcomes of the council as follows:

Several institutional changes resulted from the council, such as the renewal of consecrated life with a revised charism, and ecumenical effort towards dialogue with other religions, . . . and the expressive participation of laity in various religious activities.

A painting by Armand Gautier of three nuns 

in the portal of a church.

As a result of Vatican II, many religious orders in the late 1960s

 put aside their traditional “habits” and began to wear contemporary clothing. When the story behind today’s posting takes place, the nuns are still wearing habits.

More than a year had passed since the council had ended and the winds of change were blowing through the Roman Catholic Church. These changes excited Sister Mary Dennis and her friends, who were eager to discover my impressions of change. 

I can remember their excitement and spirited discussion. What I don’t remember is what I said that so riled Sister Mary Dennis. Whatever it was, only a few minutes later she excused us to her friends, and she and I began a silent walk back to her residence hall.

After the first block, she said, her voice irate, “How could you say that to my friends?”

“What did I say?” I asked, puzzled.

A vociferous scolding followed. She accused me of being condescending and of insulting her friends. Not understanding even then what had been so bad about what I said, I stammered an apology, feeling stupid. Inept. Insensitive. A lout.

My whole life came rushing back, flooding me with the fear that I would be abandoned again. That this friend now knew just how despicable I was and how unworthy of love. And that she would have nothing more to do with me.

That had been my fear since my parents had seemingly abandoned me when I was five and entering kindergarten. When they’d moved to Parsons, Kansas, where Dad had found work in a munitions factory, they left me behind with a married couple who were their friends. My grandmother insisted they’d abandoned me.

Ultimately, they returned to Kansas City but for much of the rest of my life I feared abandonment. Feared that I’d say something or do something that would—for unknown reasons—anger my parents or my friends and they’d discard me.

Sister Mary Denise’s scathing staccato of blame brought that fear surging back and I began to sob. Deep, gulping sobs racked my body. Uncontrollable sobs. Sobs so deep I had to fight for breath.

I stood on the sidewalk wailing. For long minutes—long, long minutes that felt taken out of time—I sobbed. It was then she made a suggestion that influenced the rest of my life. Next week, I hope to share that change in my life. Peace.

All photographs from Wikipedia.

Snakes in the Outhouse

Today’s story for my on-line memoir is one that amuses me. It shows just how trusting and naïve I was at age seven. Adults and children also were always pulling practical jokes on me because I could be duped so easily. This particular story is about an outhouse joke.

         When Grandpa Ready died in March 1943, he had completed much of the work on the retirement home he planned for himself and Grandma Ready. She offered the house, which still needed plastering, painting, window framing, flooring, electrical work, to my family for $25 a month rental.

         For the next two months, while I finished first grade at Courtney School, Dad worked in the evenings on the house. He plastered and painted the walls and completed the flooring in every room but the kitchen.

         Dad lived there until his death in 1975. I lived there until 1954, when I went away to college at Mount Saint Scholastica in Atchison, Kansas. I came home only for the summers, and then left for good in 1958 when I entered the Benedictine convent in Atchison.

         Dad never completed the house. No painting of the shingled one-story house, no window framing on the inside, no finished flooring in the kitchen. And no indoor plumbing until after I was in the convent and the city brought water out into the countryside. Every few months, a truck arrived at our home, carrying a supply of water to fill our well.

         Without running water, of course, we had no indoor bathroom and so used a slop bucket, which my brother emptied each morning through the hole in the outhouse seat. It’s that outhouse that Grandma Ready picked as a subject for teasing.

         “Dolores,” she said. “Be careful when you use the outhouse.”

         “Why, Grandma?”

         “Snakes live in the muck. They wait until they see a person’s bottom on that seat. Then they jump up and bite you!”

         I shivered at the thought.

         “They’re poisonous.”

         “You mean they can kill me?”

         She walked to the outhouse with me, opened the door, and pointed to the hole. “They’re hiding down there. Waiting to leap up and bite your butt. They’ll kill you lickety-split and you’ll fall into the muck.”

         From that day forward, I never sat on the hole. I’d put my hands on each side of me to support myself as I held my bottom up above the hole. I figured that if I were three inches above the hole, the snakes couldn’t reach me. They were able, I thought, to jump just to the edge of the hole. That far; no farther.

         Three inches assured no poison. But I was doomed if I sat on the hole.

         Until I was nearly eleven, I continued to do this. The story always rang true to me. Then one day Mom opened the outhouse door, not knowing I was inside. She apologized and then, noticing my position, said, “Dolores, what are you doing? Why are you holding yourself like that? Why aren’t you sitting on the seat?”

         I explained about what Grandma had told me. “Mom, it’s not safe to sit,” I said. “I hope you don’t sit. You’ve got to be three inches higher. The snakes can’t jump that far.”

         “On, Dolores,” Mom moaned. “Your grandma was just joshing with you.”

         “She meant it, Mom.”

         “Believe me. If there ever were any snakes inside there, they’re long since dead.”

         “Really?”

         “Really.”

         From then on, I sat on the outhouse seat. Much more comfortable, believe me. And Grandma? She said, “Really fooled you, didn’t I?”

         Yes.