Putting on a habit (or uniform right now for me) makes random people comfortable talking to you about anything.
Yesterday we went to the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception for the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the dedication of the altar of Mary Help of Christians. Sitting with some of my companions waiting for Mass to start, an elderly gentleman came up and took the open seat next to me. He turned to me and began talking about the Basilica. I asked him if he had been at the dedication of the altar 50 years ago which launched him into telling me about himself. He lives at the Veteran's home in DC and since he's 94 years old he figured he should go yesterday because he just never knew how much he longer he would be able to go out. Then he showed me the speaker device he had for his hearing aid because he had lost most of his hearing in combat. "Take care of your ears. Stay away from all those loud noses and things or else you end up with bad hearing like me. They didn't tell us that back then. And make sure you brush your teeth. They didn't tell us to do that either and I didn't brush mine." At this point he popped his dentures out of place and showed them to me. "See. You got to take care because you only get one shot. God only gives you one body. God bless you." And with that he turned back forward.
It was very sweet of him. Although it really took a lot to control myself when he popped out his dentures to not get a little bit of the church giggles, but I kept myself composed.
This particular situation is really a mild case of what happens in habit/uniform and honestly it could have just been an older gentleman taking a chance to share some things he had learned in life with a young person. Either way I take it as preparation for the conversations that could happen when I don the habit, God willing.
1 comment:
That's hilarious! Your story reminds me of my Grandpa Bolen - he had dentures my entire life, and his favorite thing to do when we were little was pop them out of his mouth and suck them back in. I literally screamed with terror the first time he did it to me; I was probably about Kate's age. He was an ornery old man with terrible hearing too!
Post a Comment