Patti Smith
It's Good Friday. Never, ever understood what was good about it. It certainly wasn't good for poor Jesus. While in Appleton, Wisconsin for 5 years, I went to St. Mary's Catholic school. What an eye-opening experience that was.
The Easter season was particularly terrifying. We had to do the stations of the cross in church. Talk about child abuse! Sheesh.
Good Friday was always a school holiday. I have memories of playing basketball with neighborhood friends, all Catholic, naturally. We had to go home and be sad in the afternoon, during the time of the crucifixion. No television, talking or even smiling was permitted during that time.
On Easter Sunday, everyone was cosmically guilt-free again. We celebrated zombie Jesus with baskets of hollow bunnies, jelly beans, and hard boiled eggs. After Easter mass of course. One year, (1968) my mother put the 45 of "Lady Madonna" in my Easter basket. Now I'm racking my brain to recall the B side... Later on Easter Sunday, there was typically be a leg of lamb, asparagus and baby new potatoes at grandma's house. Strawberry shortcake for dessert. My Wisconsin grandma made the best strawberry shortcake ever.
When mother moved us back to San Francisco in 1970, I was quite relieved to go to public school again. Oh, and the B side was "The Inner Light."
3 comments:
I was raised Catholic and went to Sunday school but I seem to have blocked all my religious instruction and memories of that time. All I remember about it was staring at the pretty stained glass windows. Good Friday is still a holiday in the public schools here in MA which is a surprise. I used to tease my bosses back in SF about wanting Good Friday afternoon off so that I could 'go to church'. My Berkeley bosses saw right through it and said, 'you are not getting the afternoon off to go hiking on Mt. Tam!' lol But then they added that if I truly was a practicing Catholic, they would have let me have the time off to actually go to church. lol
Such interesting memories. It is wild how much religion shaped things in our country. We had Good Friday off from public school (if I remember correctly, it was so many years ago). That was perplexing to me, a Jewish girl, who didn't get Passover off! Good thing we were not religious in any way, so any day off from school was a total treat!
Experiencing Good Friday in San Miguel in Mexico was something else.
Even I, athiest though I am, was moved.
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