While members of this Catholic Church, for the years that we did not attend school there, we did have to attend Catechism classes on Saturday mornings. One year, I rode with friends of the family back and forth. On the final day of classes, they simply left without me. They were returning to New Orleans where they were from and possibly forgot about me. Unfortunately, they weren't the only ones to forget about me. No one came to pick me up. I waited out front of this building above, I believe the rectory, all the rest of the day. A nun came out at one point and asked me why I was there. I explained what had happened and that nobody was likely coming to pick me up unless I called home. She was reluctant to allow me to use the phone, perhaps because it might have been a toll call. Considering how much we donated each week to the offering tray, I was disappointed that they wouldn't pay for a single, short call. But as the hours passed, and I sat and stood and walked around, and waited, she saw that I was still there and not likely to be going anywhere, even if it got dark. She finally relented. When I at last reached my dad on the phone, he said that they thought I'd come home and gone out to play without anyone having seen me. A half-hour or so later, he pulled up out front and I finally got home.
Speaking of donations to the church, one evening after mass, since I had been given a new rosary, my dad took me over to the rectory to have the priest bless it. We entered to a rather shocking, if not typical, event, the altar boys and the priests were on the carpeted floor with a huge pile of coins and cash, separating everything. I believe I was shocked because it appeared to be a bit unseemly to have a priest, in his fancy clothing, on his knees, hands deep into coins and bills. The priest readily got up from the carpet, proceeded to bless the rosary, and then we thanked him and left, still a bit disturbed by the sight.
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