LETTERS TO THE DEAD: SEVENTEEN

6/17/2018
Penny Lally (1917 – 2014)

Dear Mom,
         I write this to you on Father’s Day, one of the “days of ocassion” when you would send cards to dozens of friends and family members. (Don’t worry Mom, I sent one to Dad a few days ago so he should get his in plenty of time, even if the postal service to the afterlife is as slow as the one down here.) Let’s see, there were holidays, birthdays, anniversiaries, graduaions, get-well=soons, and sorry-about-your -losses. I think if Hallmark had known, they would have done a commercial with you standing in the aisle reading aloud every card for “7 Year Old Grandson” while the other customers gathered round to hear your evaluations.  The best ones came for St. Patrick’s Day when you enclosed green ribbons or buttons for us to wear. You’d call early that morning to make sure we had our Irish on.
         As digital technology appeared you were thrilled to be able to use email, Facebook, texts and skype. You were close to many of yout 60-to-70 nephews and neices (who called you “My Aunt Penny”) and wrote them personal notes of encouragement or slant-wise advice that they took to heart. Smartphone just made it all easier.  When at age 91 macular degeneration hit, you went back to snail mail and your familiar cursive became an awkward scrawl; but without fail you were still able to get your point across.

         I guess my own early history of letter writing was always a topic of pain for you. No, I was not in prison, just a Catholic seminary for all of high school and two years of college. Every Saturday morning we had to turn in a two page letter to our family, or the Prefect would take our free time away. So week after week these forced missives would arrive and you’d be the only one to look at them. They were full of the bland life of religious regiment that made it hard for you to read between the lines. Of course you saved them all. When you gave them back to me about twenty years ago, after I moved to the farm with Jennifer, you said they made you sad because you’d missed seeing me grow up. (I’ve not cracked them open since – don’t know if they’re still around.)
         Only after Dad passed away did you tell me that you felt he and his brother/priest (Uncle/Father Mike) had railroaded you into letting me go off to become a priest at such a tender age. And it was the year Dad died (1983) that Paul Hendrickson published his bestselling book “Seminary” that detailed some of the hard truths about that school. You both read it, but never asked if I had experienced what the author described. And it was another decade before I admitted to you that I was one of the students Fr. Terrence had molested. (We called that jaundiced creep “THE FROG”.) It happened when I was a senior and he was my “Spiritual Advisor,” under the guise that he was going to help me with my wet dreams. ( How convenient he was also Prefect-of-Seniors whose room had a door that opened into the dorm!) Thank God that even Naive Me realized how weird those 2a.m. “spiritual” sessions were and I stopped going before he reached the final stages of his “cure.” Mom, it certainly would have livened up my letters home if I had described some of those sessions, but the Prefect was also the Censor for all letters, coming and going…Honestly, I had tried to put it all behind me and hardly thought of it until Paul Hendrickson’s book came out.

         As usual Mom, I’ve gotten sidetracked writing about myself. That’s what letters are for I guess – filling in the blanks…The midnight hour is rapidly approaching and this Lexpomo deadline reminds me of how you’d watch the clock to make sure you got your cards to post office on time…Of all the people I’ve ever known Mom, you’re the one I’m most certain is in a good place.

All my love, Jim