Memories of Januaries past

This morning I had a conversation with a high-school classmate of mine, Vic Suarez, who is now vice-principal of our alma mater, St Francis School in Watsonville. He told me that the kids are beginning a week of celebrations for the feast of Don Bosco, and that the day will culminate with a mass with Bishop Sylvester Ryan, the outgoing bishop of Monterey, and Bishop Garcia, the new bishop.

Well, the conversation brought back memories of those precious days when we were students St Francis. I always loved January best… that is after the semester exams, which terrified me.

Yes, exams! When we'd walk out of the exams Vic Suarez (who was a 4.0 student) would begin asking me how I answered this or that question… I'd break out in a cold sweat because I could never remember any of the questions that he used to bring up. Years later, when I read Harry Potter and would see Hermione asking Ron Weasley and Harry Potter about "how did you answer the question about…", it reminded me of our high school exams, Vic Suarez, cold sweat and all.

After exam week we'd have a week-long retreat. I absolutely loved it. A whole week with great preachers (in 1963 Fr Joseph Costanzo came from San Francisco; in 1964 Fr Arthur Brainard came from Richmond). These dynamic Salesians totally inspired me then. But I also remember the retreats as an opportunity to spend some intimate time with a great spiritual book from our musty library collection. During my freshman year I read the life of John XXIII (A Man Named John, by Alden Hatch) and still have great visual and sensory memories of sitting under the red woods on the slope leading down to Kelly Lake to read that book in the afternoons.

And after the retreat, with the souvenir card, we had the three-day feast of Francis de Sales and John Bosco, from 29 to 31 January. In 1966 many Salesians came for the three days -- priests and brothers. I can still see in my memory the concelebration with 22 priests. I was so amazed by that, and thought the church was really moving forward! Roger Luna had composed a special mass, and I remember Vic Tousignant was the thurifer… Why do I remember Vic Tousignant being the thurifer that year? I don't know, but incense just seemed to sum up the solemnity of that wonderful feastday in my teenage mind, I suppose. Well, I also remember all the melodies and antiphons that Fr Roger taught us.

The feast of Don Bosco would feature an afternoon banquet, and all the students were expected to dress formally in suit and tie. The food that day was always tremendous: Italian style (but being Italian, I didn't even recognize that this was special until my classmates ooed and awed over the Lasagne and the Rosemary Chicken, and the gelato for dessert. Finally, we would end the feast with an "academia" in the evening: an entertainment prepared by the students that featured musical, poetic, comic and artistic presentations.

Photo: Feast of St John Bosco, 31 January 1966, at St Francis Watsonville

January and the Salesian feasts! That was always a wonderful time for me as a kid in the 1960s. I hope that the young people in our schools and parishes are having a similarly wonderful experience in 2007!