Fifty Years Ago . . .

I was eight and in the middle of my third grade year. I don’t remember many specifics, but I know that the school uniform was a light blue shirt, clip-on navy blue tie, some sort of dark trouser and shoes that could not be tennis shoes. I also remember that on particularly snowy days, we wore

galvanized rubber black boots with five buckles – nearly impossible to stretch over shoes without the help of bread bags miraculously facilitating the process.

I’m not sure if it was worse to be seen using the bread bags or, heavens forbid, being caught wearing waffle-textured white long underwear. There was a lot of stress trying to be a fashion maven at St. Mary’s grade school in 1969.

I also remember that in 1969 man landed on the moon.

My brother and I lived about a half mile from school and routinely walked to school eastward along West Elm Avenue to Monroe Street, turning left (north) and crossing under the aegis of “safety guards” who wore a bright orange canvas strapping that designated their absolute and solemn authority to guide us, the incapable, across the street; they may have been fifth or sixth graders. I knew that if I could ever wear one of those cross-chest orange straps, I would not only assure safe passage across streets, but I’d likely save whole families from burning buildings. Alas, I never got to wear the orange – I don’t know how many families were lost.

Before that third grade year, the parish priest, Father R. Francis Paquette, who served in that role since 1954, died and each grade-schooler was paraded past his body at the local funeral home. In second grade at the time, I had no concept of death nor understood why this person was laying there in priestly garb. My clearest memory is his fiercely shined shoes and that the nuns continued to remind us not to touch him.

I only reach back to 1968 because shortly after Fr. Paquette’s death, Fr. Carl Gentner was named parish priest (a role he’d fulfill until 1987 – four years after my graduation from college). As much as I could recall, and piece together from overhearing various adults at the time, Fr. Gentner was brilliant, grumpy, assumed an alcoholic, alienated from the diocese and, despite all of this, he delivered remarkable homilies and delivered the parish from debt to surplus. He also had a German Shepherd named “Sarge.”

(A self-indulgent aside: Sarge’s pen was adjacent to the playground and balls kicked into his pen were routinely destroyed – clearly, this was an animal to be feared. For some reason, one day I reached through the fence, petted Sarge and he and I became pals.)

I remember stopping by the rectory without previous arrangement during my seventh or eighth grade year, knocking on the door and Fr. Gentner answered the door. I said I had some questions – he invited me in, listened to my questions, and, with a kindness and respect I admire to today, offered some answers. He then gave me a book: Thomas Merton’s The Way of Chuang Tzu.

I am still working to fully understand Merton's text . . . it is a great challenge. Thank you Fr. Gentner.

Anyone hoping for a report of priestly malfeasance, sorry – he was a true pastor and, though a flawed man, he wasn't a predator.

On December 31, 1969, for some reason, I was mesmerized by big expectations about the move from the 1960s to the 1970s. I don’t know why, but I thought there would be something magical at midnight. Maybe it was the moon landing? My parents allowed me to set an alarm so I could see the magic of a decade changing. I slept through the alarm.

I’m rambling.

I started this because it amazes me that I have such clear memories of fifty years ago . . . that I not only see shapes, recall smells, and recollect conversations – I also remember the moon landing and understand context from the time. This isn’t bragging – it is instead celebrating my human experience. I remember earlier times and times since . . . and each memory informs my walk today.

We are about to move to a new decade . . . there isn’t the drama of the Y2K crisis (it wasn’t). And, yes, we are unlikely to change much between 12/31/19 and 1/1/20 . . . it is, however, a milestone that someone may will recall in 2069. If you were in charge of collecting ideas/news to go into a time capsule to be opened in 2070, what would you preserve?