I decided a month or so back to write about things that seem important in my life. Many of them found their way into my book which is fiction, so the stories don’t represent all the facts. These represent the facts as best as I remember them.
Prayer
When I was a little boy, I lost my guns and holster. I must have been searching all over for them because my mother told me that I came running into the house and said, “Mommy, Mommy, I searched and searched for my guns and couldn’t find them. I prayed, looked up, and there they were in the tree right above my head.” I’ve never forgotten the story and it has given me a belief in the power of prayer. I prayed for our family all these years, and while nothing in life is perfect, I believe it has made a big difference.
I was an altar boy when I was in elementary school at St. Gertrude’s on Main Street in Stockton. The priest who prepared us for the task was a great guy. His name was Father Woods. He joked and laughed with us. When we were bad, he made us do things like stand and hold our arms out until they hurt so bad, we couldn’t hold them up anymore. He had two others. He made us squat down on our legs until the pain became unbearable or he’d have us lean against a wall with the tips of our index fingers. Maybe it was because we were boys, but we loved these playful tortures. Maybe we figured they toughened us up.
In those days there were four masses. The first was at 5:30 AM. The second at 6:30, the third at 7:30, and a final mass at 8:00 I believe. When I served 5:30 mass, rather than riding back home, which was a 3 mile bike ride, which seems like nothing today, I went to all the masses that followed. My greatest possession at the time was my daily missal which had Latin on the left side and English on the other. It had all the gospels, epistles, and other readings for the day. The church was dark and the only lights as I remember from the back of the church where I knelt, were on the altar that had two large angels keeping watch. The priests were wonderful to us. They joked and laughed and told us stories and treated us a little like adults. I find it sad to think of the boys who didn’t have the joy of this experience, either because they didn’t serve or because they had an evil priest.
To be continued
It’s great to see you writing dad, and I look forward to more of your stories, I enjoy these, it is like a time capsule. I can’t imagine attending so many masses in one day, no wonder those donuts don’t kill you. As a wise man once said “before there was cholesterol there is God”, and I guess it is apparent which one is most important.