THE ALTER BOY.

Recently as I was passing a church there was a funeral going on that took me back to the old days of yore, or yesteryear or maybe the past.

I, was an altar boy resplendent in surplice and cassock, duty bond by Jesus, the priest, and my mother and of course, God. That was not the order, but Mom was on top of the list. My job was survival and the need to live beyond the next hour, and that is where Mom came in. She thought that if I were a regular churchgoer, my life would then become devoted to Jesus and the Church where I would then be saved from certain eternal damnation. We all harbor hopes.

Being how I hated to go to church, this was all new to me, and my best friend, Jerry, was leading the same life as I was. His Irish background and my Italian background were leading us to the same inevitable end, fun on the altar!

Mom was excited as I took home my altar boy card to practice the Latin responses that would clear my path to Heaven. Every night we would sit in the living room with the card and she would drill me in the responses that were written in red type on the card.

After a while, even I got all the responses down pat and was allowed to serve Mass. This was a major change of events, Mom thought her prayers were answered and that she would see me one day in Heaven along with the other angels and saints. This was an auspicious occasion, meaning all my relatives were to come to the Mass and that Grandma was to be imported once again, this time to East Patchogue, NY., rather than Ellis Island.

There, sitting in the front row of the church was Grandma, my Aunt Angie, my Uncle Joe, and Mom and Dad. Grandma muscled out the usual old ladies that sat upfront for her Joe-Joe’s first ecumenical presentation, praise be, to God.

Alongside me was my friend Jerry, his parents and siblings strung out behind my mob and eager for the first prayer to be set in motion for the congregation. 9:00 A.M. Mass was always crowded, and on this very hot and humid day the windows of the church were all opened since it had no air-conditioning. To make matters worse, I was hungry as I stood on the altar under the long poled crucifix that led us to the center stage.

There sat Grandma as the service began, her rosaries in her fingertips, her lips moving at the rate of a humming bird’s wing over a flower.

I was given the honor of holding the patent, a dish that had a handled that the altar server held under the chin of those receiving communion. I found very quickly that this young lady I had my eyes on was approaching the altar rail and kneeling for her wafer, one I would guarantee would not fall on hard times or the floor. As she knelt and the priest, Father Jeremiah J. Dineen reached her, I gently nudged her chin up and Father Dineen became unglued or at least thought something was wrong. He stopped in mid-air and looked down upon the latest love of my life as she gaped in his face with horror in her eyes! The real horror was mine as Grandma and Mom were next! Both cast their eyes upon the wayward Altar boy in wonderment.

This honor and ringing the bells were usually only attainable after serving for a while and proving you would come back once again when called upon. It was the thing of power! You rang it and the people like Pavlov’s dog, responded in kind, one ring, for one thing, one continuous ringing for something else, and as you did, you felt the sounds and movements of the faithful respond to your command!

There was one other thing that made being an altar boy fun was racing through the Confitiore or Act of contrition. A long prayer that was said in Latin out loud by the altar boys in unison, or so they thought. Jerry and I would race through it and the first bowed head raised was the winner!

After the Mass, Grandma squeezed my cheeks with both hands and with her ring filled fingers kissed then into the air while Mom looked at me cross-eyed. Dad was happy it was over so he could loosen his only tie that Mom bought for him for this occasion and Uncle Joe another non-church goer like his brother my Dad said it all: “You looked like a chicken feeding in that long prayer with your heads bowed!”

Needless to say, this essay will not help get me into Heaven! Maybe when I do finally go, there is a way I can write to Mom from where I suspect I’ll be.