Authors: June Ahern
Seething with anger, Maggie bared her teeth and hissed at June.
Cathy didn’t like the look on Maggie’s face. I hope she doesn’t spoil the day, she worried.
The church was transformed into a heavenly garden filled abundantly with fresh, colorful spring flowers emitting sweet scents. After the congregation settled into the pews, the procession started with the Monsignor walking down the main aisle sprinkling holy water over the parishioners. Behind him came both of the parish priests in pristine white and gold vestments flanked by several altar boys. Once they were all assembled in the sanctuary, the organist heralded in the children. Boys and girls in their respective lines came through the front doors to parade around the church on opposite sides. The girls were dressed in a rainbow of pastel dresses with wreaths of garden flowers adorning their hair. The boys had their hair neatly slicked down and wore crisp white shirts and dark pants.
As the lines snaked around the pews, the children sang in harmony praises to God’s mother.
“
Oh, Mary, we crown you with blossoms today. Queen of the angels, Queen of the May.”
When the children finally settled into the first rows of pews, the eighth-grade girl chosen to crown Our Lady would enter the church. As the organist began to play “
Ave Maria,”
heads craned backward to watch the chosen one walk down the aisle.
Beautiful as a spring goddess, Maggie, poised between the church
’s heavy wooden doors, waited to allow time for the parishioners to view her. A murmur of appreciation spread throughout the church. In a periwinkle-blue gown, holding a wreath of delicate white roses cut from the MacDonalds’ garden, she gracefully glided down the burgundy-carpeted aisle toward a life-size statue of Our Lady waiting to be crowned by the maiden. So lovely was the honored maiden, no one would have guessed that only an hour earlier she had been involved in a fight with her sister.
After the ceremony, parishioners spilled out of t
he church into the warming May day, eager to get to breakfast. Jimmy emerged, gripping his Kodak Brownie camera and squinting into the sunlight. He looked out to the group of people. “Do you see her?” he asked Cathy.
Cathy spied Maggie with Mother Superior and the Monsignor. The rotund priest
had his arm loosely around Maggie’s shoulders, leaning down in to her face, smiling and talking.
Jimmy saw her at the same time.
“There she is!” he said, rushing down the church steps.
Cathy spotted Annie and Mary amongst the crowd and beckoned them over. Jimmy and the Monsignor were vigorously shaking hands when Cathy and the girls joined them.
“You must be so proud of Margaret being the chosen girl to crown the Blessed Virgin. Maybe someday Margaret will become a real bride of Christ,” Monsignor gushed, his fat red cheeks shaking as he pumped Jimmy’s hand up and down. Cathy thought how Monsignor reminded her of a fat rooster crowing for praises.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mary jab Annie with her elbow and giggle. She had a good idea what Mary was c
ommunicating to her sister. She too, was amused at the idea of her boy-crazy daughter becoming a nun.
Jimmy proudly winked at Maggie.
“She’s a good girl, alright.”
An exaggerated moan escaped Mary
’s lips. The group stared at her, puzzled by her utterance. Quickly, Annie said, “She’s just hungry.” The attention turned back to Maggie.
“I understand
Margaret will follow Anne to the Girls Convent High School. What a reward!” Mother Superior beamed a proud grin at the parents.
“
We have no choice but to send them all to Catholic higher learning. That’s where our girls belong, right Cathy?” Jimmy said, his grin broader with each compliment.
Cathy nodded her head
“yes,” giving a half smile. For weeks she had fretted over the cost of the high school’s tuition. Maggie had not won a scholarship like Annie had.
Loud voices of children squealing and singing interrupted the conversation. They looked over to the schoolyard to see a group of young girls dancing around a basketball pole, holding the various colors of streaming ribbons attached to it. Cathy
’s attention went to the bright red hair flying around the circle. Her heart sank. It has to be June, she thought. Mary mumbled, “Oh-oh.”
Monsignor inquired, hesitatingly,
“Mother Superior, what’s going on over there?”
“
I don’t know,” she sputtered nervously, licking her lips, uncertain if she, the Mother Superior of Holy Savior School, was guilty of some sin.
“
I know what they’re doing,” a sugary sweet voice sang out.
Everyone looked at Maggie.
“Sister Noel has been teaching her students about the old pagan celebration of May Day. She said it’s the story of Mother Earth giving birth. The pole is the Father Sun.” She hesitated, giving the group a pleasant smile. She continued in a singsong way. “The ribbons are like him showering down his love over all the young maidens. Whatever that means.” Maggie’s bright green eyes, wide with innocence, looked directly at the Monsignor.
The adults stood frozen in place.
Monsignor finally gasped out, “Mother...”
“
I’ll take care of it, Monsignor,” Mother Superior said, regaining her poise. With arms swinging as though to propel her faster, she marched over to the happy, cheering children.
Cathy seethed at Maggie. She knew she
had had a plan up her sleeve to get June in trouble after the earlier fight between the sisters.
“
Bloody troublemaker,” Jimmy swore under his breath, looking toward the playground, his temper starting to brew.
With hands folded within her habit sleeves, Sister Noel stood facing the children, quietly watching them. Although her back was to Mother Superior, she did not jump with surprise when a voice gruffly asked, “What is the meaning of this, Sister?”
The pretty young nun slowly turned to her. With eyelashes lowered, she hid her eyes.
“It’s a celebration of May Day, Mother,” she answered with quiet dignity.
“
We just did that in church, Sister Noel, in a lovely Catholic celebration,” Mother Superior said.
“
Well, Mother, this kind of celebration for May Day is still done throughout many countries. I thought the children would like to learn about how other countries celebrate…”
“
We do not celebrate pagan holidays, Sister. Was this June MacDonald’s idea?” the older nun asked, glaring at the dancing girl.
Sister
Noel had had a premonition she should cancel the pagan celebration. When she told June, the girl begged her not to cancel it. She said they must honor the renewal of spring in the old ways, as Sister had taught the class. Sister decided she must support June’s interests and ignore her intuition. The two continued their plan to surprise the fourth graders with ribbons to dance around the basketball pole as though it was a maypole. The young nun had not asked for Mother Superior’s permission.
“It was my idea. I take full responsibility,” Sister Noel said as she turned to squarely face her superior.
Grim-
faced, the Mother Superior said, “I am shocked by your decision to so blatantly desecrate one of our Holy Days, Sister. Dismiss the children immediately, then come to my office.”
* * * * *
AFTERMATH
UP UNTIL THE MAY DAY
fiasco, the girls often visited the altar in June and Mary’s bedroom to pray or merely to share stories about life in The Valley. At times even Cathy would sit before it to recite the Rosary.
After the Maypole event Jimmy beca
me suspicious about the altar. He said June couldn’t be trusted to behave like a good Catholic girl. He questioned her about what she did at the altar. “I believe you use it for your sinful pagan practices,” he had blared.
When they reached home after the catastrophe at church, he stormed up the stairs to destroy the altar, while June and the rest of the family stayed froze
n at the foot of the staircase listening to the violent crashing of glass and ripping of paper. He then yelled, “June, get up here!”
With her wreath of flowers still clutched in her hand, the little girl hesitantly trudged up to her father. Everything
––the candles, incense holder, and the small sacred objects––was tossed in to a pile. Even the angel picture Maggie had drawn when they lived on Market Street, was pulled off the wall and torn up. Luckily, June’s tarot cards were hidden in a drawer.
As she stood enduring his wrath she noticed a broken piece of a small object roll under the bed. Quickly, June snuck a glance at it.
It was a statue of Our Lady, a special gift Sister Noel had given to her. When she first put it on the altar her sisters had laughed, because the statue was of a black Our Lady. Her sisters said God’s mother was a white person. June didn’t care what they thought and placed her prized gift in the center of a circle of small pebbles. Now all that was left of it was the head and shoulders.
“I’ll teach you
yet how to faithfully follow our religion,” her father panted breathlessly from the destruction as he unbuckled his thick belt. June braced herself, determined not to cry too loudly.
After a few loud slaps and only one yelp from June, Jimmy stomped down the stairs buckling his belt. He mumbled something about meeting Sand
y and banged out the door. Dour-faced, Cathy didn’t acknowledge him. Instead, she told Maggie to set the table for breakfast.
“Should’
ve poisoned him years ago,” Annie muttered under her breath as soon as he closed the door.
Only Mary had heard her
and she quietly agreed. She followed Annie upstairs to help tidy up the mess. Silently, the two girls tossed the broken objects into a small trash pail.
In opposition to their father’
s overbearing rules, Annie showed loyalty to her sister by recommending a new altar be hidden in the laundry room in the basement. He never went in there, she assured June.
Later that evening while their father and mother watched
“The Ed Sullivan Show,” Annie recruited Mary’s help to empty the trash. They took the trash to a large garbage bin beneath the front porch. In privacy they went through the bag from the bedroom and rescued anything that hadn’t been destroyed beyond further use. Annie decided the sky-blue candle, chosen to celebrate May Day, could still burn and tugged up the wick in an attempt to fix it. The white candle was too smashed to be repaired.
“We’
ll just buy another one,” Annie said smugly.
She was sure
she could sew the ripped scarf that had covered the altar. She also saw one of the glass candleholders had only a nick and two of the seashells collected at Ocean Beach were still intact.
Mary stuck her hand in the bin and brought out the b
ottom half of the black statue and said, “If we find the top part, I’ll glue it together.”
Task completed, they snuck into the basement through
a side door. It was there they stashed the booty in a trunk filled with old toys and household things.
Before the week ended, Annie’
s plan to set up the ironing board in the laundry room to give the girls easy access to the new altar had been put into motion. As Cathy watched the three girls carry the board, iron, and basket of wrinkled clothes downstairs, she wondered aloud what was going on.
“
It only makes sense, Mom,” Annie said nonchalantly. “The basement is only steps away from the clothesline. Plus, the dining room will be free of cluttered laundry.”
“
Is that right?” Cathy murmured and went back to sweeping the kitchen floor.
As Annie pred
icted, Jimmy never noticed the altar was set up in the laundry room. She also decreed that June was to cease talking about her visions and angel for the sake of peace in the family.
Grateful for her sister’s help, June readily agreed. “
No! Away!” she would say sharply. Dismissing her visions was not as easy. She’d squeeze her eyes shut and shake her head to free her mind of them. Unfortunately, a headache always followed the dismissal.
Maggie was under threat to keep her mouth shut, or suffer the penalty of their father finding out about her make-out sessions with Eddie at the Castro Theater. When
Maggie retaliated by saying she’d tell their father about Dave, her sisters banded together and said they’d all deny any knowledge of Annie having a boyfriend.
On Monday morning when June returned to s
chool the elderly music teacher, and not Sister Noel, greeted her. The substitute teacher announced to the class Sister Noel had been called away unexpectedly and she would be teaching the fourth grade for the remaining weeks until summer break. The old nun was kind, although rather dotty and yet, June was still too fearful of creating more trouble to venture an inquiry into Sister Noel’s whereabouts. Numbly, she did as told, finishing schoolwork and housework without question or joy. In time, her father resumed ignoring her and the nuns ceased causing her grief.