My Stolen Diaries – Chapter 22: O Holy Night

Teri's Novelog — My Stolen Diaries, , , ,

CHAPTER 22

O HOLY NIGHT

December 1965

I have never seen Mem so happy and so relaxed. She’s been sewing secret gifts for all of us while playing holiday music nonstop. Her favorite song is O Holy Night by Nat King Cole, and she plays it on our record player over and over and over again.

Mem says that after what Adam did for us, the song has even more meaning to her than before.

Her favorite part of the song is:

♪ ♪ A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices. For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn. Fall on your knees, oh hear the angel voices. ♪ ♪

Life has indeed been glorious since moving to Success Park. Mere Germaine and Mom share a room with twin beds, and I sleep with Mem in the bed Adam gave us.

Mem says that Adam was our guardian angel and our Christmas miracle, and we all agree.

Speaking of miracles, surviving seven years of St. Ambrose Catholic School is also a miracle because all the nuns except Sister Regina Mary are beastly and mean!

Mom says it’s because they never “get any” and calls them frustrated old bitties, but only when Mem and Mere Germaine aren’t around.

When I ask Mom what the nuns never get, she tells me I’m too young to understand.

I used to think it was sacrilegious for her to say bad things about the nuns, but now I agree. The nuns have a terrifying way of humiliating us girls.

They put their fingers together in a point and pound them into the top of our heads. Ouch is right. The constant digging of their fingers into our skulls can’t be good for us.

The boys have it worse, though. The Sisters grab both their ears and yank them hard, causing their heads to bobble back and forth, which I’m sure rattles up their brains.

They also torture us in other ways, like stalking and roaming around with a wood pointer and whacking it on our hands whenever they feel like it.

Once, when Mother Superior caught me chewing gum, she made me walk around with it stuck on my nose all day, including recess, which was tricky because it kept falling off. By the time school was out, the wad of gum was filthy and speckled with who knows what.

Another time, she read a note I sent to my best school friend Vicki about a boy I had a crush on—over the load speaker to the entire school!

The good news, though, is that I am still one of the most popular girls in my class, and now that we don’t live on White Street, things have never been better.

However, there is some bad news—my friends are still not allowed to come to our apartment because I’m still from a broken family.

But at least I don’t feel ashamed of where I live, just sorry that people think my life with Mem, Mom, and Mere Germaine is broken.

Click here for Chapter 23: She’s an Awkward Girl

Thinking of You Today

Mother's Day & Father's Day

My grandmother Mammy

taught me

that men and women

are not created equal.

She believed that women

were superior to men,

created by God

to endure

and withstand

both emotional

and physical pain.

She knew a thing or two

about pain.

I can still hear her today

explaining the birds

and the bees.

Explaining that two

weeks a month, we

women are

reminded by God

that our bodies

are divine vessels.

As His vessel, God has

tasked us

with a week of pain

leading up to our

sacrifice — a week of blood flow.

Those were her words of wisdom,

and I was afraid. But she told me

to be proud. Proud to be chosen.

The pain we live with as women

is why we are superior to men.

A week of pain followed by

a week of blood flow.

Only a woman can

carry and deliver a baby.

Thanks be to God.

Speaking of babies, my grandmother

always promised me that she would

take care of mine, but she

died before they were born.

If I had to describe my grandmother

in a word, it would be:

Pain.

At 70

Observe & Ponder


[My self-portrait with the help of AI]

From birth to age 12, my mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother were my heroes. In my teens through 21, my heroes were my friends. Then came the boss heroes who guided me through the corporate ladder climb. Once I reached my 40s, my husband morphed into my hero. And in my 50s, I looked for the hero in my kids. Then I went heroless for a while.

And now, at 70, I see that the hero I spent a lifetime searching for was inside me the whole time.

Here are my notes to self on the arrival of my 70th birthday:

At 70…

I am not too old.

I will plant another butterfly bush, so more will come.

I can spend the time I have left in any way I choose.

The clock is of no import to me now.

I’m still a work in progress.

Endings might just be more beautiful than beginnings.

I can finally focus on what I want to do and not what I need to do.

The most tragic and regretful goodbye is the one that was never said.

Money is not the answer to everything, but it helps.

The family I have isn’t all the family I need, but I have hope.

I’m not at peace. But I’m working on it.

I now know that to exist is to survive.

Friends come and go, but some surprise you and stay forever.

For the first time in my life, I can do whatever I want, whenever I want.

I am more than the sum of my Bridgeport parts, but I will never forget where I came from.

The adage “You get what you give” is not always true.

I don’t want anything I don’t already have.

Sometimes goodbye, not sorry, is the hardest word.

My hard work actually did pay off.

I will say his name. But not yet.

It is never too late.