I just can’t
remember the saint whose name I took
at my ‘04 Confirmation.
Last year one
friend took Hildegard. She’s a library scientist.
This year another
took Dymphna.
She’s an artist turned celibate. I turn cringey at the sight
of yellow, which
Anatomy of the Spirit
leads me to believe is third chakra stuff. Blocked
energy corresponding
to (*ding ding ding*)
Confirmandi solar plexus intuitive bleh. I wore a salmon knit
sweater with a cowl
neck and tweed
skirt that November. I killed it up there. I was the first or second
reader at the lectern
closest to the stained
glass rolling hills of Bethlehem, warbled panels all of them.
Turns out there were
loads of virgins
to choose from. Duh. So did I really ask for clearance
on Mary Magdalene
as I recounted to
my two dear converted friends? Did Mrs. Zmrhal really scoff
at me in her tricked
out, Berber-carpeted
basement where she and her husband presided over R.E. for us
ragtag bunch of
junior-year misfits?
My peers play-by-played that week’s SNL during
our carpools there
and back. I never had
watched it. Now I won’t let myself look up narthex.
It’s either the post-
Mass doughnut room
or the side bitty chapel where I confessed in the pew behind
Father Ted, all the while
he’s looking to the baseboards,
slow nodding his head, which I guess I took to mean you can’t
surprise me, Lauren, don’t
worry, I’ll stop you if you do.