My Last Year with the Nuns
By Matt Smith
Note: This is an excerpt from the play “My Last Year with the Nuns,” written by
Hiller Matt Smith and directed by Bret Fetzer. It has been slightly adapted into an
essay format.
All the eighth-grade boys were singing.
Tantum ergo sacramentum
vene remur cernui
Tantum ergo. In Latin. We wearing our uniforms: blue sweaters, white shirts, salt-
and-pepper cords. In front of us, the girls: white shirts and blue plaid skirts. On
the other side of the church, the seventh-grade boys behind the seventh-grade
girls. In front of us: sixth, fifth, fourth, third, second, first. The entirety of St.
Joseph's School. Over 800 children, and not a priest in sight. This was practice
for singing at Mass, and the nuns were leading us.
Tantum ergo sacramentum
vene remur cernui
et antiquum documentum
novo cedat ritui
And I came to understand, with the enthusiastic support of my best friend, Hank
McGee, that I could make a noise, the origin of which no one could trace, other
than my best friend, Hank McGee. This is the noise that I would make:
Tantum ergo sacramentum
vene remur BWOAAAAGH!
et antiquum documentum
novo cedat BWOAAAAGH!
And the nuns sensed that something was happening, but they couldn't put their
finger on it, as anything evil, so they let it go. But success is a heady beverage,
and at one point the song ended, and all you could hear in the church was
BWOAAAAGH!
And the church got extremely quiet, as quiet as I had ever heard the church,
even with no one in there. And no one moved. Until finally, the nun we called
Conda—C-O-N-D-A, Conda—slowly moved her attention back toward the eighth-
grade boys. And the entire congregation knew that Conda was now slowly
moving her attention back toward the eighth-grade boys, because it had to be an
eighth-grade boy to make that kind of a noise. Conda had a rare ability. She
could look at a boy and by looking, know whether he had done the thing that she
had in her head. She was like a great tracker who could pick up a moose turd,
tell you which way the moose had gone, and why.
I was sitting toward the front of the boys. She began in the back, looking at boys'
faces, and knowing. Click, click. One by one. Looking, and knowing. Click, click.
Getting closer and closer to me. Looking, and simply knowing. Click, click, click.
I make a decision. I will raise my hand and confess. They respect that. They call
it "courage," and they'll be much easier on me in the long run. So I go to raise my
hand, but my arm will not move. I compose myself, and I go to raise my hand
again, and I learn that I don't have that kind of courage. I look at the boy to my
left and at the boy to my right, and I study them, to see what a boy looks like who
hasn't done anything wrong. Then I realize that I'm sunk. Meanwhile, she's
getting closer and closer. Click....Click., and I just wait for the doom to fall upon
me.
I hear the tinkling of the chandelier, and I feel a vibration in the ground beneath
my feet, and the earth begins to shake, and the chandeliers start swinging back
and forth, back and forth, and the pews are rumbling! Rumbling! All over the
church! This is the Great Seattle Earthquake of 1966! It's happening now!
And that doesn't stop her. It just slows her down a little bit.
“I'm going to find that boy,” resolves Conda. “That boy needs to be found.”
And it's not until she hears the voice of Mr. Ding—Mr. Ding is a sixth-grade
teacher. He's the only male teacher in the entire school. Mr. Ding has a tuft of
hair, black and greasy, at the front of his head, that he uses to cover his entire
head. When we were in the sixth grade, there were certain girls who seemed to
have a crush on Mr. Ding, but it seems impossible now. It must have been a hard
two years for Mr. Ding, who yells out:
“Everyone run for your lives!”
At which Conda makes one last "Click" and then goes over to deal with Mr. Ding.
She doesn’t say a word because she doesn't have to. She just looks at him, as if
to say, "You are not in charge here." The nuns are in charge, and Conda is in
charge of the nuns.
And the nuns are in their element. Think of it--the earth is shaking, this could very
well be the end of the world. Who better to be than a nun, in church, with 850
children, in uniform, singing Tantum ergo in Latin? Their life choices are looking
good right now.
And we pray. And we pray. And we continue to pray until everything is safe. And
for the moment, that noise is forgotten.
They lead us out of the church, first the first-graders, then the second-graders,
and finally the eighth-grade boys. And as they file us out, I see something that
surprises me. Not so much that it's there, but that they allowed us to see it. The
cross—and I'm talking about the big one—has fallen from the steeple and lays on
the lawn in front of the church, shattered.
You would think that they would keep us in church and continue praying—
praying is a good thing—and get the man with the accent to clean it up, or, if
nothing else, invoke the story of Lot's wife—Lot's wife, who was told in no
uncertain terms, "Do not look back at that burning city of Sodom," but she did.
And she was immediately turned into a pillar of salt.
Do the first-graders know which your left hand is?” Conda asked. “Okay,
everybody raise your left hand. That's right. Good! We will not be looking to our
left.”
And we wouldn't have. We would have looked straight ahead, as they asked us.
But they didn't do that.
About a half-hour before school was out, they led all the eighth-grade boys back
into the church. And again, they marched us past this cross, which was still there,
on the ground. I didn't understand at the time why they let us see this, but I think I
do now. It was for my benefit.
They wanted that smart-aleck boy to understand that there may be a connection
between the making of a rude noise in church and the shaking of the earth, and
the shattering of this cross, and, yes, the weakening of the Catholic Church in the
United States over the next 25 years.
They seated us all together, but we were in a different order. My best friend,
Hank McGee, was behind me and a little bit to the left. He was the only one who
knew that I had made that noise, and he would never tell on me.
Conda began: We know which one of you boys did this. We're just hoping that he
has the courage to tell the truth. Isn't that right, Sisters?”
Now in the seventh grade, that would have worked. But things have changed.
And I know now that if Conda knew that I had made this noise, we would not be
going through this rigmarole right now. I would be in the act of being punished, as
we speak. And for the very first time, in my life, in relationship with a nun, I'm
thinking: 'Advantage, Smith!' The turd has gone cold! We wait. And we wait, and
we continue to wait and my confidence grows until Brad Carter, the boy sitting
next to me, finally raises his hand.
“Sister? I'm the manager of the Seattle Times newspaper shack, and if I don't get
down there very soon, all the deliveries in the neighborhood will be late.”
Which includes the Catholics, which may mean a telephone call or two—and this
is where the nuns blink.
“All right,” concedes Conda. “If you can get the boy sitting next to you to
guarantee—swear—that you did not make that noise, then perhaps, you can go.”
And I find myself raising my hand!
“Sister, I was sitting next to Brad Carter, Sister, and I can guarantee, Sister, that
Brad Carter did not make that noise.”
Conda: You two boys can go.
I get up to leave, and I look back at my best friend Hank McGee, expecting kudos
and encouragement, But that's not what I get. His face is all contorted into a
bizarre cocktail of emotions. And I don't know that he can handle it! And I find
myself raising my hand again!
“Sister, I was also sitting next to Hank McGee, Sister, on the other side of me,
sister, and I can guarantee that Hank McGee did not make that noise either.”
Well, Conda knows of the friendship between me and Hank McGee, and she
takes a good, long look at me. And at Hank Mcgee. And then again at me.
Conda: You three boys can go.
And McGee pops out of his chair like a jack-in-the-box with a shit eating grin on
his face. And I think, (stammering with excitement, under his breath) "Get it off!
She's gonna know!!" But she doesn't seem to notice. We get out past the first set
of doors, and I get a shit-eating grin on my own face.
And it's only then that Brad Carter realizes, "I wasn't sitting next to Smith!" But
what's he going to do about it now? Go back? I doubt it! Finally we get to the big,
huge doors. It takes two boys to open these doors. The light comes bursting
through; it's the breath of life! I'm free!!
About an hour later, Hank McGee and I—who shared a Seattle Times paper
route—had gotten our newspapers from Brad Carter at the paper shack, and
they were in a cart, and we were taking them to my route, walking by the church.
We thought we'd have a little peek inside, just to see if anybody was still in there.
We sneak open the side door, and we peek inside, and there they are. The same
seven guys who get blamed for everything. They do most of it, but get blamed for
it all.
David Shields, king of the dirty joke. He's there. David Shields has a paper route,
but that doesn't stop them from keeping him late. David Shields is going to have
a horrible afternoon. Other paper boys are gonna steal a couple of his
newspapers, just to have an extra or two, he's gonna be late, it's gonna cost him
money. Joe Clay, the badass of the eighth grade. He's there.
Syphilis. A guy they called Syphilis, for no apparent reason other than it seemed
to suit him. And four other criminal types, who would never tell on me or anyone
else, even if they knew, because they would not give the nuns the satisfaction.
The Magnificent Seven.