chapel

Some of my memories of the school are reference points.

During my junior year, it was at the end of the school year, the month of May. May is the month of the Mary, the Virgin Mary, the Blessed Mother. Every day during the month of May, just before dinner at 6:00 pm, all students are marched to the chapel to say the Rosary.

There I would be, along with all the boarding students of the school, kneeling in chapel from 5:30 to 6:00 pm saying Hail Mary's, prayer after prayer for a full thirty minutes. The sun would be shining through partially opened stain glassed chapel windows. The fresh spring/summer air would come into the area while we students prayed ... "Hail Mary full of grace the Lord is with thee ... " and I would think. My predominate thought would be: "I will soon be leaving this place! It has been almost four and three quarter/five years. Five years in this school! And I would look at the partially opened chapel windows and see some of the blue sky with the sun shining and my spirit would lift. One more year to go. One more year!"

And true to form, one year later I was in that same chapel. The same prayers of all 200 students murmeriing, "Hail Mary full of  grace, the Lord is with Thee ... " It was mind bending. I will be  free in a few weeks, I will graduate. I had done it! I had finished, six years here at this place! Six years! There will be no holding me back. I will be set free! It seemed unreal, like time had stopped, and there I was thinking about it. All these years I had endured the school and the assemblies, the walking in file, the study hall, classrooms, the organized sports, the rec hall, all of it. And now I would be set free. And all the time the prayers kept on ... "...pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death ... "

We would file out of chapel and go along the darkened corridor, the dark wood stained and polished doors to the private offices of the Brothers S.J., down a staircase to the basement and into the dinning hall. It was all so routine. But this was different. My time was coming. I would be free.