by CW Ullman
This seemingly tranquil life made Charlie nervous, because when things were going well, he worried something would happen to upset the balance. When his mother asked him to attend midnight mass for Christmas Eve, he could not have imagined how this innocuous request would impact his and Molly’s lives.
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Charlie had not been a practicing Catholic for a long while but agreed to attend Mass for his mother’s peace of mind. At the age of seven, Charlie began questioning the tenets of Catholicism because of Mrs. Elise Norton. Down the street from Charlie, when he lived in Tulsa, were Ramsey Norton, his little brother, Aiden, and their parents. Charlie, Ramsey and Aiden all went to the same private Catholic school, Monte Cassino, run by Benedictine nuns. The school was named after a monastery in Italy established by St. Benedict. When the boys were in the first grade in 1957, they were taught from the Baltimore Catechism that the only true Christians were Catholics, and only true Christians were going to go to heaven, while all the non-Catholics were going to “burn in hell for eternity.” This came as a great comfort to Charlie, because he was Catholic.
One day while at the Nortons’s house talking with Mrs. Norton, Charlie told her about what he had learned in Catechism class. Charlie had a massive crush on Mrs. Norton and thinking he would impress her, he gave a recitation of what was on the first page of the Baltimore Catechism. At the end of his presentation, Mrs. Norton said that Ramsey and Aiden were Catholic because their father was Catholic, but she was not Catholic; she was a Christian.
Charlie exclaimed, “You’re not Catholic? You gotta become Catholic, Mrs. Norton.”
She suppressed a laugh while telling Charlie that she liked being a Christian.
Charlie said, “But, Mrs. Norton, Sister Mary Gertrude told us that only Catholics are getting into heaven. If you don’t become Catholic, you’re going to burn in hell for eternity.” Charlie, at seven, did not actually know what “eternity” meant, but he figured it was a long time and being burned at all was not good.
Mrs. Norton tried to allay Charlie’s fears by telling him she would be all right, but Charlie thought Mrs. Norton did not understand the gravity of her situation. She might like being a Christian in the same way Charlie might like to fly off the roof of the garage like Superman, but she was kidding herself.
So he jumped on his bicycle and peddled home as fast as he could. When he got to his house, he ran his bike into the bushes near the front door, and ran through the house yelling for his mother. He found her upstairs sitting at a sewing machine.
“Mom, Mrs. Norton is in big trouble,” Charlie urged, out of breath.
“What kind of trouble is Mrs. Norton in?”
“Mom, Mrs. Norton is not Catholic. She’s gonna burn in hell for eternity,” Charlie announced. “We gotta do something.”
Colleen looked over the sewing machine at Charlie and answered that Mrs. Norton would work things out.
“Mom, she can’t work things out.” Then in a louder voice because either she had not heard him over the sewing machine, or had missed the magnitude of the crisis, Charlie said, “SHE’S NOT CATHOLIC! WE GOTTA BAPTIZE HER!”
His mom said God is very forgiving, He would look kindly upon Mrs. Norton, and Charlie should go out and play because she had to finish her sewing.
What on earth is wrong with his mother, he thought? MRS. NORTON IS GOING TO HELL and his mother wants him to play?
He waited for his father to come home that night, and because he was a man, Charlie was sure he would understand the seriousness of the problem. Charlie told him about the pickle Mrs. Norton had gotten herself into, and how they needed to baptize her.
He took his father’s hand and said, “Let’s go.”
Chris Palmer explained that Mrs. Norton had enough time before she died to get herself right with the Lord, and Charlie should not meddle in other people’s affairs. All of this was very confusing to Charlie. Sister Mary Gertrude said only Catholics were going to heaven and everybody else was doomed to hell. Charlie had just seen the movie, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and wondered if his parents had been snatched.
That night he prayed to God not to send Mrs. Norton to hell because she was real nice and he really liked her. On the following Monday, he asked Sister Gertrude about Mrs. Norton’s problem and she responded that God would take care of it.
Now in 1978, to keep his mom happy in her belief that there was still a slim chance God would take mercy upon her son and let him into heaven after he died, he accompanied her to midnight mass on Christmas Eve. As a further appeasement, he also promised that when he had children they would be baptized Catholic at birth.
After mass, Charlie said he wanted to stay in the church for a few more moments to meditate. He kissed his parents and told them he and Cindy would come by for their traditional gift exchange and dinner the following day. A few minutes into meditation, he heard footsteps coming from the front of the church down the main aisle. The steps stopped at his pew. He tried to ignore it, but could feel someone staring at him. When he opened his eyes, it was hard to make out the person because the light from behind cast her in silhouette. All he could discern was the shape of a nun. She probably wanted him to leave so she could lock up.
Then he heard, “Charlie from Tulsa, you’re not from around here are ya?”
He turned again to look at the woman’s face from a different angle and he recognized her right away, but thought he had to be hallucinating because this woman… was a nun?
“Teresa?”
“It is Sister Marie Celeste now, Charlie from Tulsa,” she said.
His mouth dropped open and he did not know what to say. He sat stunned as he she sat next to him.
“Well, aren’t you going to give me hug, Charlie from Tulsa?”
He got up slowly staring at her and stiffly gave her a hug.
“What…how…uh…you’re a…nun,” Charlie said.
She sat him down in the pew and they looked at each other for a long moment.
She said, “I have so much to tell you. I almost don’t know where to start.”
“I’ve got all night. Start after you left in the morning of 1967,” Charlie said.
“Shush. That was my previous life. I sent a couple of letters, but I never heard back. Did you get them?” She asked.
“Yes, and I tried answering, but they kept coming back. Your last letter said you had gotten married,” Charlie said.
“Oh, Charlie, I don’t have time now, I have to get back to the convent. Can we get together after Christmas? I want to hear about you and your family and I have so much to tell you,” Sister Marie Celeste said.
“Yes, please, let’s get together. My parents have the number for the convent.” He continued, “I have thought about you for years.”
“Well, Charlie from Tulsa, I have to lock up here. Will you walk me back to the convent?”
She opened a panel of switches in the vestibule and flipped them until the church was completely dark. As they walked to the top of a long flight of steps, she put her arm inside of his, just as she did twelve years before at the Monterey Fairgrounds. And, as had happened twelve years ago, Charlie’s heart was in his throat.
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They agreed to meet on Monday, December 28, at the Kettle, a restaurant at the corner of Manhattan Beach Boulevard and Highland Avenue. Charlie had already secured a booth in the back. When she appeared after early morning mass, he waved her over and stood as she approached the table.
“I have to ask you first,” she said, “what are you doing in Manhattan Beach, California, Charlie from Tulsa?”
Charlie responded, “When I was in the Navy, a group of my buddies decided we were all going to live together in a house in Manhattan Beach. I wrote my parents, who then moved out here from Tulsa prior to me getting out of the service. The houseful of sailors didn’t happen, but we all are here now. But, the bigger question is you,” he pointed at her nun’s habit, “and what happened?”
“I was saved by the O
ur Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I was lost, Charlie, I did horrible things. I was married, had a baby, lost the baby, became addicted to drugs, and attempted suicide before I came to the Lord,” she said.
Charlie was leaning on every word. He had heard similar stories from people in the ashram. Like Sister Marie Celeste, they had lived hardscrabble lives and bottomed out; some had attempted suicide, but all had come to the end of the road and were desperate for help.
“Teresa, I-,“ she interrupted him.
“That girl does not exist anymore, Charlie. I am now Sister Marie Celeste,” she said.
“Sister, can you tell me what happened?”
“I was really a mess, Charlie. Some of it I would rather not discuss. I was just lost, I was, gosh I hate to admit this, with a lot of men. I wanted to know love; be loved. My relationships kept turning out badly. I had a baby who died and I spiraled down further into drug addiction.”
If all this were not enough, she added another surprise when she said, “I go to Alcoholic Anonymous meetings.”
Charlie stared at her, still not knowing what to say.
“Well, Charlie, you better close your mouth or you’ll collect flies in there,” she kidded..
“I’m…I’m…,” he stammered.
“Well, tell me about yourself. When I saw the name Palmer on our church rolls, I wondered if Dr. Christopher and Colleen Palmer were relatives,” she said. “Last time I saw you, you were embarking on the Great American Sojourn. How’d that turn out?”
Charlie recounted the travelogue after Monterey, but it took a lot of effort for him to not ask about her life. He was not satisfied with her explanation of how her life blew up leading her to join the convent. She wanted to avoid talking about the gaps, but that was what Charlie wanted and needed to hear. He did not know how to bring up what was clearly uncomfortable for her to recount, so he continued on about his trip around the country, signing up for the Navy, and describing the duty stations in which he served. He did not want to mention the eleven-year-old girl. He said he too had had a drinking problem. He described the ashram experience in detail, which really piqued her curiosity.
“Did you feel like it brought you closer to God?” She asked.
“Not really, but it made me be more open to him. I felt the Presence more distinctly. How do you like being a nun?” he asked.
She crossed herself and kissed the crucifix on her belt. “It gave me something bigger to love. When I had boyfriends, even my husband, I fell out of love with them. Most of them were fine; I would just lose affection. When that repetition of failed relationships continued, I turned to alcohol and drugs.
“One day I stepped into a church and I got down on my knees to pray,” she said. “I begged God for help. I was on the street with nothing. The nuns from the church gave me a place in the convent to sleep. I knew this was where I belonged. Four years later I was wed to Jesus and took the name Sister Marie Celeste.”
“You didn’t just give me a line from the Mamas and The Papas?” kidded Charlie.
She looked confused for a minute and then realized ‘I stepped into a church…’ is from “California Dreamin’.”. She laughed and said, “You’re good, Charlie from Tulsa.”
Her amusement was more of the girl he had met those many years ago in Monterey. The weariness in her eyes was curious to Charlie. Her voice had a bit too much enthusiasm in it and when she skipped over gaps in her life, she would look away from Charlie. He needed to hear about the blank spaces.
“Getting used to you as Sister Marie Celeste is going to take some time. Do you think it would be possible for us to do this again, and not wait another twelve years,” he said.
She giggled and replied, “It has been too long and this was much too short. I want to hear much more about you, the ashram, and your family.” He wanted to hear about her life; the experiences that put the lines on her face and the tiredness in her eyes. He thought with time she would eventually tell him. She was hiding something and he felt she wanted to share it with him.
He wanted to say that at one time he was madly in love with her and wanted to marry her. He was sorry he did not get her address or go to Pismo Beach and try to find her. He thought of her all the time and would not have joined the Navy or gone in the ashram had she married him. He had never found another girl that he had loved as much as her. With him, she would have had the elusive love that had evaded her all her life.
But, she was different now, not just that she was a nun, but she felt delicate. She seemed to be in the convent more than the convent was in her. There was tenuousness about her and she appeared to be almost haunted by something or someone. He did not know if her nervousness stemmed from being out with him, or she was just nervous. He wanted to guard and protect her and prove his trustworthiness. But there was also a sense of foreboding. This dichotomy of innocence and culpability was similar to Darla.
“Sister, I am in the Beach Rotary Club and we’re always looking for projects to work on like the Joslyn Center, schools, you know that kind of stuff? Does the convent or American Saints needed any work done?” Charlie asked.
“That’s very sweet of you, Charlie, but then again I remember you as being a real gentleman. Let me check with Mother Superior and I will let you know.”
She stood to leave and Charlie hugged her good-bye. He said he would call the convent to get together again, then she turned and left. He watched her walk towards the door and saw her flagged over by a family with little girls who were excited to see her. Charlie sat down and watched her with the family. When she left their table, she seemed to stand taller and appear happier. When he got up to leave, he noticed that she had dropped her rosary beads in the booth. He picked them up, inspected them, and decided to keep them.
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A month after he saw Sister Celeste, they met again at the Kettle for coffee. Charlie decided before the meeting that he was not going to talk about their previous assignation. He would talk about her calling to the convent.
“Last time we talked you spoke about asking God to help you. Tell me more about that?” Charlie requested.
“It was a miracle, Charlie. I just put my life in the hands of Our Lord Jesus Christ and he saved me.”
“I understand that and I believe you. Had you ever asked before?” Charlie continued. “How was it different this time?”
She looked at him as if she were just seeing him for the first time. The tentative gaze was gone and she seemed to relax. She leaned back into the booth and put her hands on the table. Normally when she talked she fiddled with her rosary.
“No one has ever asked me that before. Have you had a similar experience? Is that what put you in the ashram?” She asked.
“You first; what happened?” Charlie asked.
“I was desperate and did not know where to turn or what to do,” she said. “I met you in ’67, right?” Charlie nodded. She continued, “I had always felt uncomfortable in my own skin. I thought I was wrong no matter what I was doing. If I was in school, I thought I should be hanging out with my friends, and if I was with my friends, I should be in school or studying. When I was studying, I was distracted thinking about something else. I could not turn off the voice – except when I was smoking pot or drinking.
“I was getting high every day and after awhile the benefits of marijuana wore off. So, I started drinking more. I was a blacked-out drunk by the time I was a junior in high school. It got so bad, I was expelled and had to take continuing education just to get my diploma. When I got out of school, I hit the road and that’s when we met,” she said.
This part of her talk was a speed bump on the way to the rest of the car wreck she was describing. Charlie wanted her to dwell longer on their meeting, but he did not know how to ask it.
She went on, “I didn’t know what I wanted to do. My parents told me I had to go to school or get out of the house. I tried a JC in San Luis Obispo which lasted a month. So, I was just on the run.”
She was looking do
wn at the table and her hands drifted down into her lap and she fingered her rosary.
She said, “I was hanging out with bad people…and staying in motels. I was trying to turn off the voice by finding love. Finding love was easier than silencing the voice. I had a lot of people say they loved me and I thought I was in love with them, but then it would be over as soon as soon as it started. I met this man in Bullhead City, and thought he was the one, because he cared the most for me. He took care of me, he had a job. He got me into my first rehab clinic.
“When I came out, he was waiting for me…so I…married him,” she said.
She retreated pensively into her memories, her eyes downcast and her shoulders slumped forward. She lowered her voice.
“I really wanted to love him, I really did, but I couldn’t. I could not feel anything for him after awhile. He was so patient and he knew something was wrong, but he never talked about it. I had such guilt over it, I tried to overdose. He found me and took me to a hospital and I went back to rehab.
“While I was in rehab, he got his draft notice. I did not want him to worry about me so I towed the line. In rehab, I did everything they asked. I stayed sober and did my best going to AA meetings, just to ease his fears; just so he would feel confident in my recovery,” she said.
Charlie wanted to stop her from talking, because he could see it was extremely hard, but before he could get her to stop, she continued.
“I have to tell you something, Charlie. I sinned horribly. My husband didn’t want to go in the service. He said he would fight the draft and if that didn’t work, we would go to Canada. He didn’t know his parents supported him in the move to Canada. I lied to him and said his parents called and said they would never speak to him if he dodged the draft
“I knew he wouldn’t go unless I talked him into it. I told him I would be fine on my own in rehab. I faked my recovery so he would go in the Army. I told him I would wait for him and be there when he came home, but I had no such plan. When he got drafted I was relieved. I was willing to do whatever I could to get him to go into the service.