The subject of perfection came up at Weight Watchers last week, and how it’s impossible to be perfect all the time. This reminded me of being a student at St. Ignatius Catholic School back in the late 1950′s.
Today people balk when they hear about classrooms with more than 24 children in them. At St. Ignatius there were 50 children in each class. Fifty kids, one nun, perfect discipline.
Here is why: one day my second grade teacher, Sister Catherine, displayed a large painting on the blackboard. It was a picture of people trapped in flames and screaming out in horrible pain. We all stared at their tortured, desperate faces as she spoke.
“Children,” she said, “this is purgatory. We go there to have our sins burned off so that we can join God in heaven with purified souls. Everyone goes to purgatory because we are all sinners, but the time you spend there will depend on how many sins you commit during your lifetime. The fewer your sins, the less time you will spend in purgatory.”
As I said, fifty kids, one nun, perfect discipline. What fool wouldn’t take Sister Catherine’s warning to heart? I resolved to be perfect from that moment on.
At the end of one school day she sent us home with a homework assignment to practice writing capital and small letters on a piece of special writing paper. With the countenance that only a nun can summon, she told us not to make any erasures with our pencils. And whatever we did, she said, don’t tear the paper.
That night I made a mistake as soon as I began writing and tore the paper when I attempted to erase it. My life passed before my eyes and I felt faint. I pleaded hysterically with my mother to drive me over to the school at 8 o’clock at night to get another piece of paper. That she did this without argument should indicate the gravity of the situation.
It was dark. I crouched in the back seat of our car and peeked over the front seat as my mother approached the convent and rang the bell. She was so brave, I thought to myself. Sister Catherine appeared with keys in her hand and escorted my mother over to our classroom. The lights went on, and a few moments later my mother returned with a stack of the special writing paper.
“This should get you through the whole year,” she said drolly. My mother was not only brave; she was a genius. She had singlehandedly forestalled any further penmanship disasters for the duration of second grade.
Despite frequent bouts of hypochondria during my eight years at St. Ignatius (that’s the subject of another story), I am relieved to state that I abandoned the notion of being perfect about the time I entered high school. I’ve been screwing up ever since on the convenient premise that humans cannot learn without making mistakes.
I wonder whatever happened to Sister Catherine, but I figure we’ll be able to catch up at length when we run into each other in purgatory.
See you both there, Anne! xoxoxo
YOu really should write a book! THis is hilarious! Oh and I’ll see ya there as well!
I love it!!
Anne,
If you were a better person, such as I, you would not have any time in Purgatory.
With the magic of plenary indulgences,, I have about 4,000 years taken off my time in the hot room.
All I had to do was a few special “extras”; go to church every morning before school, pray constantly, not touch myself in an inpure manner, be nice to my Mom, and I got time off for good behavior.
Well, I wouold have even more if I had been perfect and not done one of the abore.