Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Catholic
A Trip Back to School

A Trip Back to School

Last updated on: September 13, 2021 at 8:50 pm by Mary Pezzulo

A Trip Back to School 2021-09-13T20:50:45-04:00 Mary Pezzulo

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Today I took a trip down Memory Lane– or, as most people call it, High Street.

I went to visit the church and school where I received Holy Communion.

When I got to Saint Michael’s, it was noon. I recalled for the first time that the classes there were staggered so that some children would be at lunch and some at recess while others were still finishing classes, to fit everyone in the cafeteria. Some children were lined up quietly by the church, single file, just like I used to line up, going to eat their lunch in the church basement. I wondered if they still served that greasy, tasty abomination known as “Mexican pizza” which left me feeling full all day. Some children were finished with their lunch and playing on the field. I used to wander around that field with my head in the clouds, composing poetry and getting in the way of soccer players. I wondered if they still called the school playground beside the field “The Big Toy.”

I wanted to go to the front of the church and hug the plaster statue of Saint Michael stomping on a dragon, but another group of children who weren’t yet on lunch break were getting a lesson from the teacher at his feet, so I prayed at a distance and left. I wonder if they still make all the children learn that sincere and truly silly song that ends “Oh Saint Michael, great Saint Michael, give us help today!”

I left Saint Michael’s school feeling happy, somehow, even though as a child I didn’t do well there. I was too neurotic and anxious for such a big busy place. My parents took me out after two years and enrolled me in third grade in Our Lady of Peace school, further down High Street, which was much worse. There were atrocious bullies in the student body and also in the faculty. The principal was a cold fish who pretended to be concerned but would do nothing about them. The teachers punished every fight with “I don’t care who started it” and punishing both the aggressor and the victim, so I learned not to ask for help. By the time I got halfway through fifth grade I had full-blown trauma. I was homeschooled after that until college.

The children at Our Lady of Peace were also at recess, playing on the playground and kicking balls in the field. It’s a smaller student body so they only do lunch and recess in two shifts instead of staggered in a more complicated way. I wondered if they still called the volunteer parents who wandered the playground ordering children around “prefects.” I wonder if they still had a rule that you had to let someone else use the swing if you’d swung fifty times, and if the children still called out the numbers as they flew back and forth.

There was a chain stretched across the driveway ordering visitors away during school hours.

I drove by slowly, remembering.

Boundaries are a magical thing.

I often ran around the field and blacktop at Our Lady of Peace, looking for a place to hide if the bushes hadn’t worked. I was shooed away from cars and the basement stairwell by yard patrol teachers who wanted to keep an eye on us. They didn’t understand my desperation to be invisible. Once or twice I stood by the edge of the blacktop and wished I dared cross that chain and run away down the street. My grandparents lived in Beechwold nearby. I could have found my way there and hid. But I didn’t.

Why didn’t I? Because it was against the rules. The chain was the boundary of the school yard. I’d get into trouble.

Children think like that. It’s why they are so easy to abuse.

Boundaries fascinate me. They are artificial, something humans imagine, and yet they hold so much power. Some boundaries are chains stretched across parking lot driveways. Some are border walls topped with barbed wire. Some are yellow lines painted on a road. Some are completely internal, rules we set for ourselves or have set for us by authorities.

Some boundaries protect and some destroy. A bully is an abuser who will cross a boundary whenever they see one, for the express purpose of causing pain. There is another type of abuser who sets up boundaries around another person, to hurt them or in a mistaken attempt to care for them, and in doing so leave that person helpless. Sometimes an abuser ends up caging somebody in a box with bullies, so the victim has no safe boundaries and also can’t get away. That was not what the horrible staff at Our Lady of Peace meant to do, but it was what they did. They put a chain across the schoolyard and left me caged with bullies they wouldn’t stop. Normal children follow the rules but bullies will do anything they want, so a chain at the edge of a blacktop was as effective as locking sacrificial victims in the Labyrinth with a pack of hungry minotaurs.

Later in life, I tried so hard to set healthy boundaries with family, but they wouldn’t accept them.

I ended up in Steubenville and went no contact with many of my relatives. I will spend the rest of my life racking my brain for what I could have done differently, but I know deep inside that I had no choice but to do that. I tried to mend ties when Rosie was born, but it went miserably and I found myself no contact again. I had never gotten my driver’s license so I was trapped without a car, chronically ill and poor, in a small town with a limited bus route, and the boundary of my whole life was the last bus stop. I felt like the places I’d known before Steubenville were imaginary, or a different planet. They may as well have been.

I was trapped in one place, but I had developed boundaries inside, to protect myself from bullies. I am feisty now and am learning protect myself, though sometimes it’s still very hard.

When I finally got my license and that miraculous car, the boundaries trapping me in Steubenville started to dissolve. I could drive to Wintersville, to Weirton, to Wheeling. Finally, we had the opportunity to come to Columbus.

Suddenly, the world seems to have far fewer boundaries trapping me inside, and I have some nice new ones inside of me.

This is what I thought about as I drove back to my friend’s house where Michael and Rosie were playing with the dog.

I was happy when I left Saint Michael’s and sad when I left Our Lady of Peace. But now all I feel is gratitude.

Image via Pixabay

Mary Pezzulo is the author of Meditations on the Way of the Cross and Stumbling into Grace: How We Meet God in Tiny Works of Mercy.
Steel Magnificat operates almost entirely on tips. To tip the author, visit our donate page.

Abuse

Previous Post

September 12, 2021

The Font Was Also Christ

Next Post

September 17, 2021 I Wanted To Tell You About Columbus

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category abortion Abuse Advent America American Christianity angel angels Annunciation Appalachia apparition apparition chaser apparition chasers apparition culture art art review babies baby baby Jesus Bad Lip Reading bad statue contest bath beauty Bible story blog blogkeeping blood book review Brandon Sanderson breastfeeding bus Catholic catholic conspiracy alarmism Catholic Oppositional Disorder Charismatic Renewal Charlie the Cat chastity Christ Christian idenitity Christianity and Judaism Chronic Illness clean clothing COD piece comedy compassion conscience conspiracy theory conversion cop-on-black violence Crucifixion cry of the poor culture Daesh Daily Saints death death penalty devotional diaconate diaper diapers dirty disability Donald Trump Dorothy Day dream drugs Eastern Catholicism Eastern Christianity education election election update Elsewhere on Patheos empathy environment Fear feminism film review fish flashback fluffy buns food Franciscan University of Steubenville Friendship Room fun Gabriel gardening gospel hair-splitting Heaven hell heresy Hillary Clinton history Holly the Witch Holy Spirit holy war Homeschooling homosexuality horror human dignity humor Icon idol immigrants infection inter-religious dialogue Interpretation of Scripture Islam Jesus Jihad Joseph joy laity and lay vocations lamb dinner laundry lent lgbtq literature love manners Mary Medicine and Science Meditation mercy mess milk misogyny Missouri monasticism monster motherhood mourn with those mourn movies movis music mystery nature neurodiversity New Pro-Life Movement news nonsense nostalgia O antiphons obituary objectification Ohio Valley Ordinary Time ordination Ordo Amoris parable paradox Passover peanut butter personal beliefs pets philosophy Planet Charismatic poetry politics polls poop Pope Francis Pope Leo power in the Church prayer prayer request prayers preferential option for non-violence president presidential election priest primary private revelation pro-life prophecy Public face of Catholicism Pure Flix Q and A race racism random rape rape. sexuality reader's request Reckoners refugee religious trauma ressurrection Right to life Saints saints and celebrations same-sex same-sex marriage satire scandal secular feasts seder Seven Joys Seven Last Words sex sexual ethics sexuality silencing six months skid row slavery social justice Speculative fiction spiritual abuse spoon stain story suffering suffrage suffragette Sunday Gospel temple Tenebrae Responsories Terror the exorcist The Friendship Room The New Pro-Life Movement Things I Learned on the Internet tin cup traffic true story tv review Uncategorized USCCB vice and temptation violence Virtue virtue and vice war Way of the Cross whimsy whole life women's ordination work of mercy Year A

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What does the Greek word 'Christos' mean?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Savior Anointed One Redeemer Lord