Midnight Mass

I haven't been to Midnight Mass for a few years. Father Kenkel, the pastor in Creston (until he retired 1.5 years ago) for the past 10 years was an old guy, and he moved Midnight Mass up to 10 PM. That was fine with me, because it meant we weren't staying up past our normal bedtime.
But it wasn't official-like, cuz it wasn't really midnight.

In my childhood, Midnight Mass at SS Peter and Paul in Atlantic was a packed house. You had to get there by 11:30 PM, in order to get a seat. Even then, you were taking your chances. One year, we took too long packing all of us - Mom, Dad, Susi, Cindy, Betsy and me into Dad's Buick. We ended up in the very back row, behind a fat guy that had some loud gas issues when transitioning from kneeling to sitting and standing - you know how busy we Catholics are in the pews. Wouldn't you know that got the Bullock girls to giggling - that hilarious contagious laughter. I don't remember a thing the priest said, but I do remember that.

Another time it was so crowded, we ended up sitting back behind the altar where they dress and store the vestments. That took away from some of the pageantry. It was a beautiful Mass. Mrs. McCauley (mother of my boyfriend during some of high school, and player at Paul and my wedding mass) played the violin. Nothing like Greensleeves. The colors in church were so beautiful in the nighttime light - remember this was back before I was a frequenter of Saturday night mass.

One year it was really snowy - like it sounds like it will be this year. Dad drove us, and we for some reason we decided to go up Bullock's Hill. That was the big hill in between our house and Fairlawns - the post WWll housing development by our house. It was a short very steep incline - I should know I crashed into the retaining wall at the bottom after a wild ride down it on my trike (no feet on the pedals). I remember the tires of Dad's car spinning and spinning as we slowly inched up the hill. But we made it.

I always was so intrigued when we got home - to see the gifts under the tree. Sometimes Santa had delivered gifts while we were gone - mostly the years Dad stayed home with Betsy. And the Midnight Mass where I was young enough to be allowed to doze through the lengthy service, was a mere memory as my nerves jangled with the thought that present for me were under the tree! (I know it's an awful run-on sentence. But this is my blog Miss Howarth and I'm writing it that way...). I was wired when it was finally time to get in bed. Sleep was a long time coming.

Betsy and I were great at waking up a daylight. We'd go out and check out all the presents under the tree to see which ones were for us. I've talked in past blogs about the cool toys we had. Christmas was an awesome time at our house. Finally, older sisters Susi and Cindy would finally crawl out of bed (teenagers you know) and we'd get to open the gifts. Little did I know the best gift was the family thing - making memories with my sisters.