And Then There Was Nun (Dominic Rotini's Version)

This is the second part of a two-part post. Read part one below first.

Considering yesterday's post, let me first set the record straight about a few things. During the infamous foul shot shoot-off during fifth grade, I was wearing Hush Puppies, not Buster Browns. I had consciously, despite the objections of my dear mother, made the choice to switch from Buster Browns to Hush Puppies at the beginning of the third grade. Additionally, I was not "bald as a cueball" at the age of twenty-one, and I am not presently. I have an ample ring of hair around my head, so much so that I visit my barber every fortnight. I am an accountant; every entry on the ledger is important.

That said, the rest of Lou Ferragamo's version is credible. I'd like to think my hundredth shot that day traveled at least fourteen feet, by I couldn't swear by it in a court of law. Speaking of courts of law, I was surprised as anyone by Joey Flippant. Not surprised that he has been indicted on 52 counts of corruption, but that while out on bail awaiting trial he called me six weeks ago with his idea that Sister Mary Clyde and I meet in a rematch in order to raise money for Our Lady of Perpetual Chewing Gum's proposed Sister Mary Philpot Gymnasium. Understandably nervous that the phone call was being recorded and that this was yet another of Joey Flippant's schemes, I begged off, saying--truthfully--that I hadn't touched a basketball in more than thirty years and that I gave much of my time and a considerable amount of my money to Our Lady of Intermittent Rain, my beloved parish for twenty-eight years now. Joey just chuckled and said, "I'm not through with you yet, Rotini" and hung up. Obviously I feared for my life until three days later when Sister Mary Clyde herself called and explained to me that Joey was seemingly sincere in all of this and that the shoot-out would be great fun and the way Joey had proposed it sounded like it would raise a lot of money and Our Lady of Perpetual Chewing Gum really needed a new gym and wouldn't I reconsider. Nuns, you can never shake their hold on you. So I agreed, despite the fact that this was happening in the middle of tax time when I am not only busiest but when both my plantar fasciitis and psoriasis are at their worst. Like an accountant's, I guess, the Lord's work is never done. I agreed once again to take on a nun in a free throw shooting contest.

Luckily, as the chief collection basket counter at Our Lady of Intermittent Rain, I have an all-access key to the parish's facilities. For the past six weeks I have used what little time is available to me to go to the gym there and practice my free throws. Bursitis is imminent, but over time I have regained much of the form that made me that playground--if not CYO--legend. Four nights ago I made 289 out of 300 shots, and promptly went home and said a rosary, praying that I had not peaked a little too soon.

Say what you will about Joey Flippant--and in a less public forum than this, I could say plenty--but last night's fundraiser was quite the show, and quite successful. That old gym (and once I saw it I realized the need for a new one and so was happy to lend what help I could for the construction) was packed, not only with parishioners and alums (Jane Filibuster, nee Octave, still sets my heart aflutter, I confess) but also, owing to Joey Flippant's current status, a lot of media. There were raffles, silent auctions, hot dogs, the school band (I smiled fondly at the boy playing the French Horn, my old "axe"), cheerleaders, and Bingo. Sister Mary Clyde, clad smartly in an Our Lady of Perpetual Chewing Gum warm-up ensemble (which, naturally, I was forced to purchase; one for myself, not hers) was beaming. Yes, her hair is stark white, but she was as robust and energetic and kind as always. She greeted me with a big hug, which was a bit unsettling to me (having never made physical contact with a nun before, discounting Sister Mary Philpot's hands on my ears), but in time I chalked it all up to sincerity and not gamesmanship on Sister Mary Clyde's part.

Joey Flippant, of course, made a big speech, and then Sister Mary Clyde spoke. She made reference to Lou Ferragamo's much-read account of the original shoot-off, contradicting the stern way Sister Mary Philpot came off there and stating for the record that, "You'll never believe it looking at me now, but back in 1969, my hair was jet black, not a red hair at all." Paulie Flugle screamed out, "I'll make it any color you desire, Sister girl!" Say what you will about Paulie (I won't), but he and his partner Skip Epstein not only pledged a hundred dollars apiece for every shot both Sister Mary Clyde and I made, but also promised to donate half of their take from every parishioner's hair styled until construction is complete, and a lifetime supply of jump ropes.

"Ladies first," I again said, and we were off shooting. Sister Mary Clyde apparently had not devoted as much time to practicing for the evening as I had. Despite having the entire gym rooting for her, and the aid of some pretty swanky Nikes, Sister Mary Clyde, at the free throw line, looked very much like the pushing 70 woman she is. The contest was pretty much over by our third round of ten shots each. Certainly I was disappointed by my tally of 72 made shots; Sister Mary Clyde was ebullient that she made 53. Realistically, though, I don't think it mattered. If we had each made 100 of 100, I don't think it would have been possible to raise any more than the $82,537.92 our shots alone raised.

All in all, despite my reservations about the entire thing, I was happy to be involved. Happy to see old classmates. Happy to contribute to the building of a new gym (with more forgiving rims, I trust). Happy to have concluded the night by reciting, with the entire crowd, a rosary for all the Our Lady of Perpetual Chewing Gum's deceased parishioners and teachers. And happy, I cannot lie, to have won.

Nun Better

Well, speaking of Bingo and county corruption trials and this being Lent and all, I thought I'd pass along one of the more legendary tales at Our Lady of Perpetual Chewing Gum Parish, here told by the most legendary Lou Ferragamo, as he regaled the crowd at last week's Catholic Bingo Workers Annual Retreat in nearby Bucyrus.

Sister Mary Clyde's her name, appropriately enough. Was then back in '69 and somehow still is, despite sometime back when the nuns could switch and use their own names. Guess she liked Sister Mary Clyde and didn't want to be known as Sister Pearl Van Arsdale. I don't blame her. She did do away with the wimple like all of them did, though. Hair white as a dove now, but back then when she was our fifth grade teacher, the color of her wimple-shrouded hair was the cause of much speculation. Joey Flippant swore he climbed the tree back of the convent one night and looked into the window to see Sister Mary Clyde brushing long locks of golden red hair. That was back when we all believed what Joey Flippant said, so the matter was settled--Sister Mary Clyde was a redhead. Of course being ten-years-old as we all were then, Sister Mary Clyde, being an adult, seemed ancient, but now when you think about it she was probably no more than twenty-three, twenty-five tops at the time. "The only nun in the school who never flayed my knuckles with a yardstick," is how George Kendall always puts it. She was nice, and fun. A fun nun, I tell you, and the memory of her is probably the only thing that kept half of us practicing Catholics still practicing for years. For years after, all through the Seventies, there were always rumors that she was going to leave the convent, but she never did, unlike most of them. Now she's principal.

Anyway, back then we boys used to play basketball every recess. One bent-rimmed, rusted-backboard, no-net hoop out on the back parking lot. No wonder none of us ever became even half decent players, shooting at that devilish hoop. So one day Henry Pale was sick and we only had nine boys and we were starting to fight about whether we should kick Paulie Flugle out of the game and play four on four or let him play and just not pass to him when Sister Mary Clyde, faithfully doing God's work tending one of the ends of the girls' jump rope, saw her chance at some liberation recreation, if not theology, and said, "I'll play." Saul, on his way to becoming Paul, was not more dumbstruck than us nine boys--a nun, our nun, Sister Mary Clyde, playing basketball? Heresy. In our paralyzed astonishment, though, Sister Mary Clyde had handed over the rope to poor lazy-eyed Jane Octave, ran over to us, grabbed the dirty orange ball from me, and proceeded to knock down a twenty foot set shot from the top of the key, left-handed. "Swish," we all whispered in reflexive wonderment (since there was no net to make the sound, we were obliged to credit one another's good shot by providing the sound effect).

The upshot of it all was, much to the jealousy of the girls and the scandalized tisking of then-principal Sister Mary Philpot, Sister Mary Clyde became a regular player in our games, which relegated Paulie Flugle (undoubtedly thrilled, absolutely thrilled, he'd tell you) to jump rope duty, where he quickly became the confidant of all the girls, which in turn probably led him to his successful career as a hair stylist, which in turn led him into the arms of his longtime partner Skip Epstein. But anyway, back on the b-ball court, we all soon became acquainted with Sister Mary Clyde's potent holy elbows and her formidable shot-blocking abilities. "Man, we'd rule CYO if we could only suit her up," Joey Flippant always said. Despite the rough and tumble games, we never did catch even a glimpse of the alleged red hair, but we delighted in having played a tough game whenever we spotted a small, sweat-darkened spot on that wimple. I can only imagine how good she could have been in shorts, a t-shirt, and anything other than those awful nun shoes.

Joey Flippant, though, as always never satisfied with just a good thing, engineered a scheme. Dominic Rotini was a pretty lousy basketball player, but he was the best foul shot shooter in the school, because that's all he practiced. Unfortunately, Dominic hardly ever saw playing time in our CYO games, and when he did he was too timid to do anything but immediately pass the ball whenever he somehow got possession of it, so he never got the opportunity to shoot free throws when they counted. Anyway, Joey Flippant, after a week of badgering, finally convinced Sister Mary Clyde to agree to his bet. If Dominic Rotini could sink more free throws out of a hundred than Sister Mary Clyde, we wouldn't have homework for a week. If Sister Mary Clyde sank more, we boys would we obliged to forego a week's worth of recess and instead have to sit in the church saying the rosary for the departed souls of all the deceased nuns who used to teach at Our Lady of Perpetual Chewing Gum. Needless to say, Dominic Rotini had no say in the negotiations.

So the big day came and by then the whole school knew about the wager. God knows how Sister Mary Clyde got it all past Sister Mary Philpot, but there was the entire school arrayed around the "court" whooping and hollering as Sister Mary Clyde and Dominic Rotini took turns firing ten shots apiece at the ramshackle basket. "Ladies first," Dominic graciously offered, and I'm sure that was the first time most of us realized Sister Mary Clyde was indeed a lady. She clunked the first two shots, made five in a row, then one out of three. As Dominic stepped to the line, the eighth grade boys, thugs, all of them, as all eighth grade Catholic school boys are, each pulled out rosaries and jingled them. Undeterred, Dominic, as we teammates were so familiar with, sank nine out of ten. "Hallelujah!" screamed Joey Flippant. "A week without homework!" Then Sister Mary Philpot wrangled his ear with a little more force than we were used to and Joey Flippant was silenced for about three minutes, a world record at the time.

Over the years, at appropriate times, I have asked Sister Mary Clyde what her true feelings during the shoot-off were: Was she politely playing along but letting Dominic win out of good old Christian charity, or was she playing to win, disregarding what might become of Dominic Rotini and his standing with his classmates if he lost? She always just smiles and says, "I learned basketball from three older brothers, two of whom went on to become all-state. You don't learn anything from cheap victories. I thought meek Dominic could use the lesson if he lost. And besides, if I did lose, I knew Sister Mary Philpot would treat me a lot worse than you boys could ever dream of mistreating poor old Dominic." That's why, after ninety shots apiece, the score was tied at seventy made (not a bad percentage at all for a wimple-wearing nun and a myopic would-be accountant in Buster Browns).

By now Joey Flippant had a score of side bets going and Sister Mary Philpot looked as grim as could be, probably imagining damning (literally) phone calls from the Vatican. Sister Mary Clyde, her wimple now completely sweat-darkened, toed the line and unbelievably sank nine in a row before rimming out the last shot. "No fair!" Joey Flippant screamed, only then realizing, "She's got the Big Guy on her side." Vinny Del Corleone tossed his rosary to Joey, adding, "You're gonna need this, Flip-Off."

I do believe Dominic, who was bald as cueball by twenty-one, lost his first dozen or so hairs as he stepped to the line, needing nine out of ten to stay alive, ten out of ten to win. His first shot hit the front rim, started to crawl over, then, be it God's will or just the way the ball bounces, fell back. We fifth graders groaned, while the rest of the crowd, totally won over by Sister Mary Clyde by this point, cheered. Joey licked his perpetually chapped lips and duly sank the next eight, all soundless swishes. Equally soundless was the crowd, except for Sister Mary Philpot, who let out a loud, "Great God!" The soundlessness continued through the last shot's arc. Unfortunately for us, and especially for Dominic Rotini, there was no in-unison "swish" to accompany the descending arc. The distance between foul line and basket is fifteen feet. Gary Toole, yes, the same Gary Toole who is now a world-renowned mathematician, estimated Dominic's hundredth shot traveled 13' 7". Airball; hello rosaries.

I tell you, I've religiously said a rosary every day for the past thirty-odd years. And no matter how much I concentrate on praying for lost souls, departed souls, terminally sick souls, the saintly souls of missionaries around the globe, even the indicted souls of people like Joey Flippant, my mind always wanders, usually in the middle of the third decade, to Sister Mary Clyde and Dominic Rotini shooting foul shots. But the killer, the ultimate riot of the whole thing is that Sister Mary Clyde is now trying to raise money for a new gym, to be named, unbelievably, the Sister Mary Philpot Gymnasium (must have been part of the bargain struck between the two in order to let the thing happen in the first place), and Sister Mary Clyde, always a cagey one, isn't above leaning on her former charges, to the point that Joey Flippant, out on bail and awaiting trial at this very minute, helped arrange a re-match. Yes sir, boys, this Saturday night, March 10, Sister Mary Clyde and old Dominic Rotini will be shooting a hundred free throws each in the old gym. And everybody in attendance will be pledging money for each made shot. Joey Flippant must have a pretty good defense fund, because word is he's got about fifty side bets, all on Sister Mary Clyde. Me, I love the woman, the best thing that's ever happened to Our Lady of Perpetual Chewing Gum. But I gotta admit, I've been saying rosaries for a month now that Dominic wins. The poor guy deserves redemption.

Tune in tomorrow for the results. In the meantime, say a rosary for all those great late nuns.

And Another Thing About Nuns...

Seemingly can't get enough about nuns. J.D. Salinger once wrote: "Everybody is a nun." Contemplate among your various selves while you watch the snow pile up.

There's A Nun In The Middle Of Every Conundrum

What is it about nuns? Even I can't resist a little shot at them. I say even I because I have known nuns all my life: I have been taught by them and I have worked with them and I can say truthfully I've never had a problem with them. In fact, I'm quite fond of them. As far as any group of people goes, they're no quirkier than the rest. So why are they always the butt of jokes and the subject of gross exaggerations in popular culture? Unfamiliarity, perhaps. But if you've been around nuns since you can remember, like I have been, they become familiar and pretty ordinary (in the best kind of way). If a little more dedicated and less worldly than most of the rest of us.

I remember the nun we had in second grade, who was pretty young (I think she played guitar and probably played and sang at the so-called "hippie masses" that were popular in the early 1970s [appropriately held in the basement of the church, the hippie mass featured guitars and not the celestial organ; I'm sure my first exposure to the music, even the name, of Bob Dylan--Dye-lan to me then and for a few years after--came at a hippie mass: "Blowin' In the Wind," "Kumbaya," "My Sweet Lord" {minus the hare krishna chants, naturally}, and even "Let It Be" were staples of the hippie mass songbook]), who one day, obviously frustrated, let out a "you damn kids," in the middle of a reading lesson. Of course we were scandalized, though looking back at who some of us were, I now tip my hat to the nun for her accuracy and even restraint in word choice.

That same nun was one of the few who at the time wore her skirt short, as in about half-way down the calf. Most still wore their black habit-skirts all the way down to the floor; thankfully the younger ones, by showing some dark-stockinged leg, removed at least one mystery for us with regard to "what's going on under all that." The biggest mystery to me was the head, covered up by the wimple (and what a waste of a potentially great word, wimple; especially now that wimples are pretty much archaic). Our nuns wore ones that snugly clung to their faces (there were pins on the side that for years I swear had to stick into their cheeks); most of them had a little flap that covered the hair at the top of the forehead. Again, thankfully, some of the more liberal ones went without the flap, so at least we knew they had human hair. Most if not all had long black sleeves, which hid anything from kleenex to rosaries to pens to maybe even a couple of aces. Besides the utter confusion that now reigns with nuns walking around in "civilian" clothes (I don't know how non-nun-upbrought people react to learning that the woman they're talking to is actually a nun, but for me, it still rattles me a bit, instantly sweeping me back to the age of eight: yes sister, no sister, and inevitably, I'm sorry sister...), I just think there was something very stately about nuns in habits, that I now miss.

We didn't have any nuns who could fly (what in the world was going on in TV land to okay the idea and then actually produce a show about a nun who could fly? and they say reality TV is nuts?), but we had some great characters. One very much loved and revered nun was confined to a wheelchair. She was of course known affectionately as Sister Mary Hot Wheels (to her face, though? I kind of doubt it; but she must have known; I hope it gave her a chuckle). Another nun was kind of the Jimmy Durante of nuns; everybody loved her. They might not have been able to do much with their hair back in those days, but it seemed that every nun was issued a loud clicker (another thing that went up the sleeve, I believe). Nothing said "on your knees" with more alacrity and authority than a nun clicking her clicker loudly in church; instantly 35 kids would genuflect, make the sign of the cross, and be back up standing upright before the echoes of the click faded away amid the cavernous church. I'll bet you five holy cards if you walked into a Catholics-only old folks home and clicked the right clicker, there would be people who usually could hardly move snap to a crisp genuflection in seconds.

One observation about nuns in the post-habit-wearing world: an observation I made years ago and still stick to. You can always tell a nun (even an ex-nun) by her shoes. Now not being a shoe fanatic, I can't really describe for you the types of shoes nuns/ex-nuns wear, I just know them when I see them. Ultimate case in point: A few years ago I was with a group of people, some I knew, others I didn't. We chatted for a half hour or so. There was one woman in the group I didn't know, who was pleasant enough, but there was something about her I couldn't quite put my finger on. After a while, in the course of the conversation, she said that she was a former nun. Like a Pavlovian dog, my eyes instantly went down to inspect her shoes and, well, let's just say thank the Good Lord I'm such a reserved individual, otherwise the entire group would have witnessed me smacking my forehead and yelping, "A nun! I should have known! Just look at the shoes!"

Here's to all the nuns I've known and know: thanks for all the lessons, the laughs, and the prayers.

Eurythmics & Aretha-Sisters Are Doin' It For Themselves