My dream was cut short when I felt my mother’s hand on the back of my neck.
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph, you’re unrecognisable!” She was having convulsions and hit me again and again on the back of my head.
A big bang went off in my left ear. Her hand felt like a shovel.
“You bloody git! You’ll make a holy show of me if you show up for school looking like that! You’ll be thrown out!”
She walloped my left ear with her other hand and I heard a bell ring. Its gong seemed to last forever but then all went silent.
A week or so later my ear was still paining me. My mother then took me to Saint Vincent’s hospital and had a doctor look at it. After putting a small light beam into my ear he told my mother I should cut down on salt and stop eating eggs altogether. It was easy to give up the eggs because I only had one every second Sunday.
* * *
On Friday mornings the Sisters of Mercy from nearby Goldenbridge Convent went around the neighbourhood in a horse and cart with a big barrel of hot mashed potatoes and parts from a slaughtered pig. Where they got the pig carcasses from I never knew and I didn’t want to know either. The smell of hot potatoes from the barrel on the horse-drawn wagon signalled to families like mine that it was time to eat. I approached the nuns’ wagon with my can which had a smiling cow’s face on the outside label. Fresh milk was expensive and rationed at the time. Condensed milk was donated by the Saint Vincent de Paul Society. With my family, the condensed milk lasted for about two days. After that the can was discarded, but the remnants of the condensed milk inside the can remained and tasted like sweet glue. I stood in line with other children but by the time the wagon got close to my house the barrel of mashed potatoes was almost depleted. Exercising her last charitable impulse of the day the nun scraped the bottom of the barrel and filled my can with crusty burnt mashed potatoes. It was just the way I liked them.
The Saint Vincent de Paul Society periodically dropped off a voucher for a pair of new shoes or sandals to every family on Nash Street. Children who went to school barefoot were singled out for the benefit. My mother decided that it was my turn to take advantage of the shoe voucher because the toes on my feet were withering away with chilblains from walking to school every day barefoot. Molly went with the voucher to Cleary’s on O’Connell Street for a pair of sandals for me and brought them home in a box but even with the coldest toes in Ireland she wouldn’t let me wear them right away. She insisted I wait till Sunday and wear the sandals to Mass. After that she said I could do what I liked with them. For the rest of the week I went to school in my bare feet, thinking about my new sandals that were in a box under my mother’s bed. Saturday night came and I washed my feet and went to bed with such great anticipation of wearing a new pair of sandals I couldn’t fall asleep. The next morning my mother handed me my new sandals. I was so sleepy I could hardly see them. Instead of shoes or boots with laces, my sandals had buckles, silver buckles that took only a second to fasten. The sandals were the first new thing I had ever owned and were a perfect fit. When I put them on my feet I thought I had died, gone to heaven and sprouted wings. In a hurry to feel the sandals on my feet I ran out the door and headed for Mass. On my way to the church I kept looking down at my feet. It felt so good I thought I was in a bus or riding a bicycle. Inside the church I kept gazing downwards at my feet. While I was doing that a person behind me slapped me on the head and told me to look up at the altar and pay attention. As soon as Mass ended I was determined to form a relationship with the leather items that covered my feet. I ran up towards the canal to test the sandals. I wanted to show them off to anybody I’d meet. I felt so free I could have jumped over the moon. When I got to the canal I decided to cross over to the other side. As I stepped on the footbridge that allowed one to cross over the canal, my right foot got caught in the chain that secured the wooden crossing. To free myself I yanked my foot and was quickly separated from the sandal that covered it. It fell into the water where it went under and drowned. I never saw it again.
When I came home with one sandal my mother threw me out of the house and I sat on the sidewalk and cried till sunset. Monday morning I was back in school in my bare feet.
* * *
I woke up in the middle of the night and my jaw was so swollen I looked like I had a doorknob in my mouth. The next morning, after a night of me screaming in agony, my mother dragged me by the scruff of the neck to the community dentist.
After we’d sat in a crowded waiting room for about two hours, a man in a white coat with the spots of blood on it came out and looked around. Behind him was a nun praying silently. The man in the white coat pointed his finger at me, then called to my mother: “He’s next!” He then turned to the nun and whispered something into her ear. The nun began to pray out loud.
The nun came over to me and asked me if I had made my First Holy Communion. My mother answered for me and said I hadn’t but I would soon. The nun asked my mother if I was baptised. My mother said I was. The nun then led me and my mother into a room where the man in the white coat told me to step into the dentist’s chair. He looked in my mouth.
“Half of them have to come out,” he said.
“Only take the bad ones out, sir,” my mother pleaded.
“Sure most of them are bad,” the dentist said.
The nun blessed herself as if on cue.
The dentist then took another look at my decaying teeth. “I assume he’s been baptised?” He smiled and squinted towards the nun who nodded while kissing the rosary beads she was holding. “I’m afraid I’ll have to put him to sleep,” he added.
“Ah Jesus, can’t you help him without puttin’ the gas-bag on him, sir?” my mother begged.
“I’ll give it a try, missus,” the dentist replied.
He then put a pair of pliers into my mouth, got a grip on one of the teeth in the back that had a big black hole in it and began to pull. The dentist continued to pull and pull. I was spitting blood like a loose water tap and crying even louder. I screamed so loud I almost swallowed the pliers and the hand of the dentist as well. The tooth would not come out.
The dentist then looked again at my mother and the nun. “I was afraid of this,” he said. He then reached for a rubber bag that was on the shelf behind him. The bag looked like a recently extracted cow’s liver and smelled as bad. “Take a deep breath,” the man with the bloodstains on his white coat said to me. Before I could inhale anything he slammed the slippery-looking cow’s liver flat on my face as if he was slamming an insect with the heel of his shoe. I could hear the nun praying louder as I screamed, pushed and attempted to resist being knocked out by the rubbery bag that was smothering me. In seconds I was gone, way gone. Where I sailed to I don’t know. When I came to the nun was still praying and I had fewer teeth in my mouth than ever before.
* * *
Receiving your First Communion showed everybody in the church that you were in a State of Grace and if you died a second after you received Communion you’d go directly up to Heaven because your soul was clean and white. At the age of seven, receiving Holy Communion gave you the right to walk to the altar and receive the sacrament with grown-ups. Many families walked up to the altar and received Communion together. First, of course, you had to make your First Confession and confess all your sins to the priest.
The Communion wafer that the priest stuck in your mouth was made at the biscuit factory. It was a small round light papery wafer that you had to swallow the second the priest placed it on your tongue. It was a sin to let it touch your teeth because if you did it meant you took a bite out of God. The Sacrament of Communion was like a passport to Heaven. Receiving it meant you had no sins or black marks on your soul. You had a white soul and that was the only kind of soul that got you by the guards at Heaven’s gate.
After you received your First Communion you were allowed to walk around the neighbourhood, knock on doors and show people that you were saved from punishment for your sins. When friends, relatives and neig
hbours saw you dressed up in your new suit with the white ribbon on your lapel, they gave whatever they could afford and congratulated you on avoiding the fires of Hell or Purgatory.
My First Holy Communion got off to an odd start. At Goldenbridge Convent which I was attending, Sister Charlotte approached me in the middle of class one day with a big happy smile on her face.
“Did you get your Communion suit?” she asked me.
I didn’t know what to answer. I knew my mother had gone to the Iveagh Market looking for a suit for me but she hadn’t told me if she’d found one or not.
“After class I want you to stay in your seat. Will you do that?” the nun asked me.
I could never say no to Sister Charlotte. Had she told me to walk backwards on my head, I would have. I would do anything for her but I was afraid to tell her that.
She was so beautiful I couldn’t stop thinking about her even when school was over. I didn’t know why my body was reacting the way it was. All of Sister Charlotte’s prayers and promises were like Christmas presents. She made me believe that all things and all people were good. Even if I had no shoes on my feet Sister Charlotte convinced me that I didn’t really need them. “Ah, you’ve such a good pair of feet, Gabriel! It would be a shame to cover them up with shoes or sandals,” she’d say to me. I felt so happy and comfortable in Sister Charlotte’s presence I forgot about everything else in my life. Sister Charlotte was my Guardian Angel. Guardian Angels were to remind you not to commit a sin when you were tempted. I asked myself every day in school: What would Sister Charlotte say if she knew I wanted to kiss her?
When the bell rang for the end of school that day, I remained in my seat. After the class had emptied out, a woman who used to cook in the convent kitchen came into the classroom with a big brown-paper bag.
“It’s all here, Sister. Clean and pressed. Like new,” she said and handed the bag to Sister Charlotte.
“Come up, Gabriel.”
I timidly got up from my seat and walked to the head of the class.
“Congratulations, Gabriel, on making your First Holy Communion this week,” she said.
The woman who’d brought the brown-paper bag in blessed herself and moved her lips as if she was saying a prayer.
Sister Charlotte then took a grey jacket and trousers out of the bag. “I think this will fit you, Gabriel.”
The woman stepped forward. “Stretch out your arms,” she said to me.
I stretched my arms out like the man on the cross. The woman placed my arms into the sleeves. “The jacket fits him,” she said, turning back to Sister Charlotte.
Sister Charlotte smiled. “This suit used to belong to one of my young brothers, Gabriel. He’s a lot older than you and he’s living in England. It’s been hanging in my room for years. I’ve kept it in mothballs.”
“That’s where I keep me husband,” the woman said.
Sister Charlotte laughed out loud.
The woman measured the trousers to my knees. They too seemed to fit.
Sister Charlotte stepped back and took a look at me.
“I have a confession to make, Gabriel.”
I thought she was going to say she loved me. My blood boiled and my face turned red.
“I’ve tried to fit this suit on boys for the last three years and it didn’t fit any of them. When you first came into my class, you reminded me of my young brother. I prayed that the day would come when you could wear his suit, and now you’re going to. Your poor mother will be happy about that, won’t she?”
“She will and thanks very much,” I said.
Sister Charlotte then put a white ribbon on the lapel of the jacket. “Wear this on your lapel when you receive your Communion on Friday, Gabriel.”
The ribbon was snow white and brand new. It was to be my badge of honour when I received my First Communion from the priest.
The sister also gave me a new prayer book with a picture of Jesus on the front of it.
“You can say your prayers with this book, Gabriel. Whenever you’re having trouble with everything that goes on around you, open this and read it. Making your First Communion gives you rights and responsibilities. Your Holy Communion Day is one of the most important days of your life.”
As I stood in front of my Guardian Angel she reached back to her desk and handed me a small box. “Open it,” she said with a glowing light in her eyes.
I fumbled with the box but managed to open it without much trouble. Inside the box was a pair of new brown shoes. I almost passed out from the smell of the new leather.
“Wear them with your suit when you make your Communion,” the nun said. “Tie the laces tight so they won’t fall off your feet.”
I was so fixated on Sister Charlotte I wasn’t able to concentrate on what she was saying to me. I felt trapped in a cage of pure love. My skin was boiling and I felt as if my hair was on fire. I could hardly breathe. I was convinced I was committing sin.
A week after I made my Communion I went to Confession and told the priest that I wanted Sister Charlotte to be my mother. The priest told me I had a mother and I shouldn’t be thinking of having another one. I told the priest that I was always wishing I could see Sister Charlotte in a dress instead of the black habit she wore. And I wondered if she painted her legs brown like my oldest sister Mary did before she left home and got married. I told the priest that I had a dream when I imagined Sister Charlotte wearing almost no clothes at all. For the act of committing sin by “thought” the priest told me to say the rosary every day for two weeks as well as six Acts of Contrition.
Sister Charlotte was the nicest person I ever met. The more I got to know her the more I believed she was a real saint who should have been living up in heaven. She told me she prayed for me and hoped that I would find everything I ever wanted out of life. She said she prayed that I would even find my lost sandal. “Gabriel, you will find your sandal. You will have new sandals with silver buckles on them as well.”
I had fantasies of kissing her but I knew that was a serious sin. Nuns didn’t kiss or be kissed. But I think I was the only boy in her class that she held hands with. Every day she’d look into my eyes and smile and say nice things to me. In the back of my mind I kept telling her I loved her and that I wanted to see her every day for the rest of my life.
Sister Charlotte was talking about how a star in the sky guided the Three Wise Men to Bethlehem when another nun came rushing into the class and whispered in her ear. The two nuns then walked to the classroom door and opened it wide.
“Everybody go home and quickly!” they said.
The room emptied in a hurry. I didn’t know what was going on and most of us in the class started to cry. One boy who wasn’t crying said the Devil had escaped from hell and he was being chased all around Dublin by Catholic angels. That bit of information made us feel better. We knew no devil could beat up God’s angels and when the Devil was caught he would be sent back down to hell and Dublin would again be safe for us to sit in school or do anything we wanted. Then in a fit of panic Sister Charlotte started to herd us out of the convent. When we got to the school gate another nun yelled out, “Infestation!” The boy who said the Devil had escaped from hell said “infestation” meant mortal sin. There was no escape from that unless you went to Confession and confessed all your sins and really meant it. I was trying to think of how many mortal sins I had committed when another nun called out to the Mother Superior of the convent: “Lice! Lice!” The Mother Superior blessed herself in a hurry. Lice weren’t mortal sins. They were bugs with legs growing everywhere that crawled on your head and in your hair. The dogs and cats and the birds in the trees had lice. Mice had lice. Somebody said the cause of the lice was eating the dead rabbits the dogs dropped on the street.
When I got home my sisters and brothers were sitting outside on the kerb. They had been told the same thing in their schools. My sisters and brothers and all the boys and girls on the street had lice in their hair. A man came by and left a big bottle of Lysol
outside our hall door. He was from some government agency and he said there was a state of emergency in Dublin because of the lice. The government handed out fine-toothed combs and paper with drawings of the lice on them. I think they drew the picture of the lice so the mothers wouldn’t confuse them with mice or rats or stray kittens or anything else that was on the loose in Dublin. All the mothers in Dublin had a big combing job every night after dinner. My mother searched our hair for lice then crushed them with her thumbnail. Crack and splatter! Poor head! Poor mothers! Poor lice! Poor Dublin!
After the lice infestation and when everybody was back in school, still smelling of Lysol, Sister Charlotte called me to the head of the class and handed me six shiny new pennies. The six pennies Sister Charlotte gave me was the most money I had ever had in my life. She also presented me with a birthday cake. It was my very first present ever and the closest I had ever been to anything that had cream on top of it. Happy Birthday was written on top of the cake. Sister Charlotte held me by the hand and told me to smile and be happy about everything. With great difficulty and shyness I managed to lift my chin and look in her eyes. I thought I was going to die when I made eye contact with her. Angels and Heaven and happiness were floating all about me. I didn’t want to stop looking. Her face was the sun shining through on a cold rainy day. I didn’t know who I was any more so I started to cry.
Sister Charlotte wiped away the tears that were falling from my eyes with her fingers. She smiled at me and told me it was not a bad thing if I cried my eyes out in front of her. When she said that I stopped crying. She then walked me back to my seat and sat me down. The other boys in the class were watching with looks of serious confusion on their faces. I sat in silence and felt numb.
Sister Charlotte came back to me with the cake in a box tied with a red ribbon. “Open this when you go home, Gabriel, and share it with your family. Your mother will be happy, I’m sure of it! And a big happy birthday to you, Gabriel!”
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