Feelings

It's about feelings at this point in my memoir--feelings of isolation, loss, and apprehension hidden just below the surface of my everyday life. I usually tried to deny and keep them to myself. Except for the few times I attempted to tell my Novice Mistress.

In response to my timid knock on her office door, Sister would usher me in. After she'd offered me the stiff-backed chair in front of her desk, she would take a seat on the opposite side and ask me what I wanted. That was all it took for me to completely bury whatever  fears or feelings I intended to share, while we sat in awkward silence and I nervously cleared my throat. I'd tell her I'd forgotten what I was going to say and sit awhile longer, remembering how she had told us during Instruction period that feelings were unimportant. How we were instead, to rely on God and our faith.

Except that I couldn't feel God or his love.I did fall back on my parents' love, though, and their letters which conveyed their pride and love for me. Otherwise, I would have felt even worse.

I must have looked pretty forlorn, because those sorry attempts I made at sharing my feelings with her usually resolved with her suggestion that I go downstairs to the music room and practice the piano for awhile. Saying it might make me feel better. Now I realize how much she cared but couldn't admit it. It was the perfect way for me to deal with feeling blue. I would head for the piano, close the door to the rest of the world, and get carried away through music. In the end, I did feel better.

Uncomfortably Close

In my last few chapters, it has begun to feel like I may be delving too deeply into my past. Some unwieldy and bothersome feeling have surfaced, making me stop to consider. What if, after I've published my book, my former nun friends and still-nun friends take it wrong,  misunderstand me, or think I'm slamming the convent?

The reactions of those closest to me are the ones that hover over my shoulder as I write. I see their disapproving scowls and raised eyebrows. I hear them say with disgust,

 "What in the world is she thinking?
This isn't at ALL how it was.
How were we to know she was so unhappy."

And so on. . . bringing my typing hand to a standstill.

The Good Girl part of me reacts. The Pleaser--ever wary of stepping out and creating controversy. 

Although I've marched to an unmistakably different drummer than my family and many of my friends since leaving the convent, I still carry a surprising whiplash instinct to conform. And telling my story from the inside out--revealing how those years affected me then and now--is what I need to write.  

*gulp* 

 So, after a brief, shuddering, pause, I perk up my ears to the rhythm of my inner drummer and resume my own dance.

Silence or Stillness?

Like it or not, part of me will always remain in the convent, even though I've been gone for over over forty years. The first five years were the strangest and most intense. It was a time of indoctrination. The same images crop up every time my mind meanders back.  Of long, polished hallways with life sized statues looming in the shadows. Of towering ceilings and endless rooms. I still remember feeling so very alone, although the building was occupied with sixty to almost two hundred women. My lips automatically clam shut in conformity to the all pervasive Rule of Silence.

Even now, although I thought I hated not being able to talk whenever and wherever I wanted, I prefer stillness to having a radio, CD player, or TV playing in the background. I relish the feeling of quiet—especially as I write. Living in a hushed household is something I had no idea I’d appreciate all these years later.