#<- he spent like eight hours on the server this day pray for me. i mean im gonna watch it fast and skip some bits but still

[atthebell]

quackquackquack quackquack. quackquackquack quackquackquack quack? quackquackquack quaquackquaquack quackquack quack.

[leilabeaux]

Luck Be a Lady

Chapter Two

Masterlist | One

Pairing: Alex x Reader

Word Count: 2590

Summary: Alex and Reader enjoy some dinner, drinks, and games. Could this be a date?

Warnings: Toying with infidelity, people freely scrolling though someone else’s phone with no disregard

----

Alex pressed his back against the wall next to your hotel room door. With his hands tucked into his pockets and his legs crossed at the ankles, he waited for you to come back out. He tried to downplay the large smile on his face but it was hard. The theme of his night was playing it cool and to not seem like a lovesick fool but he was in disbelief over his luck. When Bianca said she was going to bring her friend over, he was temporarily stunned to see the same woman that had caught his eye at the airport two days ago.

He was waiting in baggage claim with Marco who was busy listing all their potential plans during their stay when he got distracted by a faint coconut scent that floated by. He looked over to see you walking past him going toward the baggage carousel. Whatever his friend was saying was now just background noise as he couldn’t help but stare at you. You were smiling and seemed like you were making small talk with an older couple next to you as you waited for your own bag to appear. 

Just as he was fine-tuning his plan to approach you with his not-so-smooth line of “Excuse me, Miss, I think you dropped this dollar. By the way, you are beautiful and will you please let me take you out sometime”, he looked up to find that you were gone. After being caught up on the one who got away, Marco reassured him that there would be plenty of other women he could hit on. He had to agree with him because what were the chances he would run into you again? Obviously, it was greater than he thought.

The sound of the door opening brought Alex out of his thoughts. Your curls were now in a messy bun on top of your head and just as you promised you were dressed more comfortably in simple tee, jeans, and your chucks which he figured probably felt like walking on a cloud to you after being in heels most of the night. He also noticed that you still had his jacket on.

“Sorry, I’ve decided that I’m keeping this. I think it looks better on me anyway,” you said with a mischievous smile as you tucked your hands into the pockets.

“I can’t really argue with you on that one. But I’ll be taking it off of you one way or another.” He countered, instantly regretting his choice of words. No more saying out loud how you want to take her clothes off, he thought to himself.

You raised your eyebrow in response, “Hmm..I doubt it. Don’t worry, I’ll give it back to you eventually.” You turned down the hallway, going toward the elevators with Alex following close behind you.

He once again felt like luck was on his side when you didn’t throw his jacket in his face and politely tell him to fuck right off. He reminded himself to reign in the comments and glances he’s been giving you before he scared you off and you decided to cut your night short. But as he became distracted by the slight swing of your hips, he thought that maybe he was in over his head.

----

The trip to the buffet was just one elevator ride down to the second floor of the hotel you were staying at. Although it featured various cuisines to choose from, you and Alex both bee-lined toward the sushi bar and unashamedly stuffed your faces full of raw fish while washing it down with beer. 

You declared yourself full as the busboy picked up your empty plates so he had a look of confusion when you left and then came back to the table with a brownie topped with ice cream. Without needing him to say anything, you quickly responded that there is always room for dessert.

If he only knew how much you enjoyed your sweets, he would have waited a moment before taking a sip of his beer. You gave a soft moan as you took the first bite of your brownie. Unprepared to hear such a sound come from you, Alex had choked on his beer and gave a few coughs to clear out his throat.

“Don’t die on me, kid. Maybe you should try sipping slowly,” you giggled and then brought another spoonful to your mouth. All the drinks you’ve had so far was giving you a warm buzz.

“Kid?”, his voice raspy as he was still trying to clear his throat. “I’m only seven years younger than you!”

“Only seven years? Aw, you really are a baby boy!,” you said with wide eyes. You couldn’t stop giggling when Alex started pouting and crossed his arms across his chest. “Don’t be a Mister Grumpy Gills! I’m just being a little shit. You should be honored, I’m only mean to the ones I like.”

Alex took another sip of his beer before leaning back in his chair and continued to pretend to be hurt by your teasing. Even if he were, he imagined it would be hard to stay that way for too long. All you would have to do is flash him a smile and all would be forgiven.

You had set your spoon down and rested your chin against your fist as you started to stare off toward the fountain display at the center of the restaurant. He pulled out his phone and decided to take advantage of the moment, capturing a couple shots of you. It wasn’t his camera but it will have to do for now. As he got ready to take another picture, he glanced at your left hand and noticed the ring you were wearing.

Alex’s heart fell. Why didn’t he notice this before? Were you wearing it this entire time? His mind went back over the past three hours he had spent with you so far and he couldn’t recall you mentioning a husband or any form of a significant other. He didn’t want to confirm what he knew to be true but he had to.

“How long have you been married?” He asked as he tried to erase the look of disappointment that he was sure was all over his face.

You appeared to be startled. He wasn’t sure if it was because of the interruption or because of the question itself. You brought your hand down and glanced at the offending ring on your finger. “About eight years,” you answered simply.

“And why aren’t they here with you? Turning thirty seems to be pretty significant, I know if you were my wife I’d be busy spoiling you and celebrating it with you,” Alex was tempted to add in bed but now really wasn’t the time.

“He wasn’t able to come. That and me and Bi wanted to have a girls only kind of trip. He’d probably be miserable doing all the corny touristy things I love to do,” you cracked a smile at this. “He’s the one treating us to all of this anyway so it’s like he’s here in spirit.”

“Is he a good husband?” He groaned internally because he couldn’t stop asking questions that he didn’t want to know the answers to.

You tilted your head as if to ponder his question before nodding, “Yeah. Definitely not perfect, but yes.”

With the warm smile on your face after you spoke, Alex figured right then and there that he stood no chance. He tried to take some consolation in the fact that you were at least being treated with the respect you deserved. He downed the rest of his beer with a large gulp as he prepared to wish you a good night and pray that your friend had already vacated his room so he could sleep his sorrows away.

His intentions were interrupted by your small gasp. “Hey! Let’s gamble and lose some money!” You didn’t even give him a chance to answer as you stood up from your table and marched over to the casino floor.

He got up from the table and quickly followed. Wounded or not, he wasn’t going to deny you anything.

----

“You were up fifty dollars! Why didn���t you stop playing?” Alex could have sworn he only took his eyes from your machine for one second and then he looked back to see you were down to the last dollar.

“Because I thought I could get more but then I didn’t. So I decided that I just wanted to break even but...uh, then I didn’t,” you pulled on the handle of the slot machine and then frowned when you came up empty once again.

He could only laugh at your sad explanation. Now he understood why after you withdrew $100 from the ATM, you handed him the cash and declared that he was in charge of the funds. 

“Maybe we should hit up the tables?” you suggested as you slipped off the stool, making sure to not forget your free drink that a server had previously offered you. Maybe not so free since you were now down twenty dollars.

“I guess if you want to lose your money even faster,” he said. He pulled out his phone and tried to get a shot of the rows of lighted up slot machines, thinking it would make an interesting picture.

“Ooo! Let me see!” You pulled down his arm so that his phone would be more at your eye level Smiling up at him, you asked, “Do you have any others?”

He scrolled through his photos to find the ones he had taken when he was back home before handing his phone to you. He didn’t know why but he was nervous as you flipped through the album. There was a part of him that was seeking your approval, a part of him that wanted to make you proud.

“Alex…,” you looked up at him in amazement before going back to scroll through his pictures. “I don’t claim to have the eye of an art critic but these are good. Like real good.”

“I mean they’re okay--” he started to say before being interrupted.

“Uh-uh, you don’t need to be humble around me. ‘I don’t feel comfortable saying I’m professional yet’, my ass,” you said mockingly as you flipped through his photo album.

“I just meant that I don’t get paid to do it,” he tried to defend himself.

“I think you could if you wanted to,” you were taking a sip of your mixed drink when you paused at one picture in particular. He could have sworn he saw a tinge of red starting to flush across your cheeks. “Oh. Ohhhh...I’m sure a gal would pay a pretty penny for this one. Did you put this one on your tinder?”

You pointed the screen toward him to let him see what you were referring to. Taken in the privacy of his own bathroom, Alex was wearing only a pair of grey sweatpants with one hand in his pocket and the other holding his phone as it took a picture of his reflection. He lept toward you trying to take the phone away from your hands before you delved even deeper into his photo album but you were too fast for him. With your back pressed against his chest, he again tried to wrestle it from your grip but again he was coming up empty.

“And what is this one, I see?” 

He quickly tried to think if he had any other incriminating pictures that he forgot to delete. Embarrassed, he looked down at the screen fully expecting to see his own dick staring back at him but instead all he saw was you. He let out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding.

“Were you expecting me to find something else? Should I keep searching?” you asked cheekily.

“Nope!” He finally managed to get his phone back, “I think you’re done.”

“Laaaame.” You whined as you continued walking between the game tables, trying to decide what you wanted to try out. “I am very surprised you managed to get my good side. It usually takes me about twenty tries before I get a decent pic.”

“I don’t know, I think all your sides are good sides,” he stated while falling instep with you.

“Ha, no but thanks for the ego boost. You’re such a charmer. Be sure to keep that up when you get that special woman in your life.”

“Your husband doesn’t try to charm you?”

“He does in his own ways.” 

“But not in the way you like.”

“I’ve always been such a hopeless romantic and he...is not. He isn’t the type to buy ‘Just Because’ flowers but he would wake up early during the winter to scrape my windshield and make sure my car was heated before I left for work.”

“What are ‘Just Because’ flowers?”

You paused to mull over your response, “When it’s just an ordinary day, no obligation because of a special occasion or holiday, you give someone you like or love flowers just because you knew they were having a bad day or just because you wanted to see the smile or just because you were thinking of them. Whatever the reason is, it’s just because.” You continued walking and didn’t hear a reply from him, “Sorry, was that cheesy? I did warn you that I was a hopeless romantic!”

“No, not cheesy at all,” he said as he gave a glance down at you. “It’s just...it sounds like these flowers would have meant a lot to you. Have you tried telling him this? I don’t think you should go another eight years without it.”

“It really doesn’t matter much now.” You polished off the rest of your drink before leaving the glass at a vacant slot machine. “Onto a more cheerful topic, I think I still have at least two more hours left in me before I officially need to pass out.”

“Just two?” He takes a seat on the stool in front of you. With him seated and you still standing, it gave you the opportunity to look him straight in the eyes.

“Yes, it’s way beyond my bedtime.” You crossed your arms across your chest. Although you were more clothed now, he was finding it hard to stay focused on your face. “So I feel I’ve been controlling this entire outing. Is there anything you wanted to do?”

Alex gave a small gulp. He felt tempted to pull you closer to him, to have you trapped between his legs only so he could make his answer clear. But instead he kept his hands to himself. “I’m fine gambling for the rest of the night.”

“That’s nice of you but that’s not what I asked. What do you want to do? Or better yet, what were yours and Marco’s plans before me and Bianca so rude interrupted it?”

“Well…”

----

You stepped up into the back of the SUV, scooting over to give Alex some room to get in as well.

“Are you Y/N?” your Uber driver asked. After confirming this, he continued reading off his app screen,  “And you two are going to the Sapphires Gentlemen’s Club?

You and Alex looked at each other. You giggled at what he was sure was the flush he felt that was taking over his cheeks. All he could think to himself was, this is such a bad idea, kill me now.

Next

End Notes: So, yeah. Looks like they are wrapping up their night with a bang, whether that includes a literal bang. Who knows? Still think our dear reader is ready to risk it all? Are you good at slots (pssh, I’m not!)? Would you allow a stranger to have completely access to your photo album?

[deadlydagger]

HOW MY RELATIONSHIP WITH CATHOLICISM HAS AFFECTED MY LIFE.

This may be an extensive story but I will try to do the best to sort it out in a meaningful way. 

My relationship with Catholicism began in 1945 when I was six years old. I was in first grade at Immaculate Conception school on East North Broadway in Clintonville, a Columbus Ohio neighborhood. A playground separated the school and the church, which was about 100 feet wide. My father would drop me off on Oakland Park St., which was the first street north of East North Broadway. I would walk through the yards of the houses on Oakland Park, which took me to the playground. There was a side door to the church, which I went through and then attended Mass in person. After Mass, I left through the same door, walked across the playground into Immaculate Conception school. The same routine occurred when I was seven years old in second grade. During my second grade year, I received my first communion, which was quite a big deal. In those days, you had to fast after midnight if you were going to receive communion the next day. I received stern warning from my parents that I should not even swallow the water or the toothpaste while I brushed my teeth because that would break my fast and I could not receive my first Holy Communion.

In third grade, when I was eight years old, Our Lady of Peace became our parish about five blocks away from our house.  I also went to school at Our Lady of Peace. Mass was said at 8:00 AM during the week which I attended daily as did many of my classmates. My father had a beautiful Irish tenor voice and he sang at mass every day at 8 o'clock. Since we could not eat anything after midnight, I either did not receive Holy Communion because I would have eaten breakfast before Mass or I would receive Holy Communion or then have breakfast of some sort at the school after Mass. I do not remember which of these occurred.

This routine was in place throughout my grade school days at Our Lady of Peace. Of course, my whole family went to Mass on Sunday. When I started carrying newspapers, which was when I was around 10 or 11 years old, my Dad would help me with the Sunday newspapers because they were quite voluminous. So he and I got up very early on Sunday mornings, we delivered all of the newspapers, finishing about just before 8 o'clock and then we went to 8 o'clock Mass, having breakfast at home afterwards. Meanwhile, my mother was at home watching my brother and sister who were younger. My Mother went to Mass later in the day. Sometimes my mother would go with me to deliver the newspapers. I always rather would have my dad do it because he would fold the papers up nice and tight with rubber bands and all I had to do was pick up the paper from the car and deliver it to the various customers. When my mother took me, she spent most of the time reading the newspaper in the car while I had to fold the newspapers up myself and then deliver them. Needless to say, it went quicker when Dad helped me then when Mom did it.

By the time I got to high school, our parish had grown enough so that Father Foley, our pastor, had an assistant pastor assigned to our parish as well. So they began having daily Mass at 6:30 in the morning and an 8 o'clock Mass as well. I was well on my way to school at St. Charles before the 8 o'clock Mass even started. Nevertheless, one of my parents and I went to the 6:30 Mass virtually every day before I traveled 13 miles to my high school.

My grandparents and my parents were great examples of practicing the Catholic faith by attending Mass and receiving Holy Communion daily and definitely on Sunday as well. Typically, mothers were the driving force concerning religion but, in our family, our Dad was the one who had an unfettered commitment to our faith. So it went without saying that I followed all of their footsteps.

My first two years in college, I went to a Catholic school, the University of Dayton in Dayton Ohio. I continued my same routine daily. There was a chapel right next to my dormitory and I went to 8 o'clock Mass there every day. Sometimes, I would have an 8 o'clock class and, in that case, I would go down the street to Holy Angels Catholic Church where they had a Mass at 12:10 PM daily. The pastor at Holy Angels was named Father McFarland. He and Holy Angels are a story in themselves.

As you can probably tell by previous paragraphs, I was a pretty devout Catholic. I had my own missal, which had all of the readings for every day of the year. I would usually get to Mass early and stay afterwards to have some quiet time to pray. So I was kind of surprised at the way Father McFarland did things. He started right on time at 12:10 PM and finished, without fail, at 12:22 PM, a 12 minute Mass. Now usually, Masses on Sundays were an hour or more including all of the Scripture and the sermon by the priest after the gospel. During the week, the Mass would usually take around 30 minutes, which comprised of the daily Scripture but there was no sermon by the priest. Father McFarland deviated significantly from that regimen.

In those days of course, everything was in Latin. The way my missal was set up, the left-hand page had the Scripture in Latin and the right-hand page had it in English. So the priest would say the words in Latin that appeared on the left-hand page and you could follow if you liked but the English translation was on the right-hand page so you could always refer to that as well. Father McFarland said the Latin mass so quickly that I could not read the words in English as fast as he said them in Latin. I always wondered why he persisted in saying a Mass that would normally take at least 30 minutes and say it in only 12 minutes. Finally, it dawned on me. National Cash Register was a major employer and was right across the street. Their lunch hour started at noon and ended at 12:30 PM. By starting the Mass at 12:10 PM, those employees could get to Mass in the 10 minutes between lunch started and the time that the Mass commenced. Then, in the 12 minutes that Father McFarland said the Mass, the employees could go to Mass and get back to their jobs by 12:30 PM. While this was nice and convenient for the National Cash Register employees, I thought it was pretty close to a sacrilege the way Father McFarlane said the Mass.

I recently had dinner with a friend of mine who went to Holy Angel’s grade school in Dayton and knew Father McFarland very well. He claimed that when it was time for communion, Eucharistic ministers distributed communion to the congregation while Father McFarland completed the Mass and then left the altar. I do not recall it that way but, of course, Vatican II allowed the Eucharistic ministers to pass out communion instead of requiring the priest do it himself. But when I was in Dayton in college, Vatican II was still several years away. So Father McFarland distributed the communion himself and still finished in 12 minutes.

One Friday during Lent I was feeling especially holy and went to Mass three times during the day. My roommate and I decided to go to Holy Angels on Friday evening for Stations of the Cross. However, when we got to the church, it looked strangely like the altar servers were setting up for Mass instead of Stations of the Cross. Father McFarland was going to do the service one way or the other so I went back to the sacristy and inquired of him whether he was saying Mass or Stations of the Cross. He said it was going to be Mass and so I told him that my roommate and I would go back up to the college for Stations of the Cross because we had already been to Mass that day.

Astonishingly, Father McFarland made a short but impassioned statement to me about the tremendous value Mass was, it being the greatest prayer ever in the history of mankind; one should never pass up the opportunity to participate in such a holy prayer. He said this so fervently that I had no choice but to stay for the Mass, however short he would make it. He took much more time than the 12 minutes that he usually spent at Mass during the week and that solidified my evaluation of why he did it so fast during the noon hour just so he could accommodate the employees at National Cash Register.

I did not receive a very worthwhile education at the University of Dayton but my religious fervor increased day by day. I went to Mass every day without fail, either at the chapel at the University or at Holy Angels. I also attended other religious services that were provided by the priests at the University of Dayton. As it turned out, things did not go well for me at Dayton but I definitely maintained my commitment to my Catholic faith.

While attending Ohio State, in addition to attending daily Mass, I spent a lot of time praying on my own, typically the rosary or just being in a meditative state. I received a jolt and an inspiration from an unusual source. While Ohio State and other state universities were considered to be secular, nonreligious institutions, my football coach, Woody Hayes, in addition to all of the other things that he did to change my life, taught me how to pray. You would think that after 14 years of Catholic education, I would be pretty good at praying but Woody change my attitude on that. Before and after every game, he would say a short prayer, maybe two or three minutes. He did not pray that we would win the game nor afterwards, he did not thank God for our victory. It was just the opposite. He acknowledged that we were responsible for our own destiny; but he prayed that we would use our talents to the best and to make the Good Lord proud that we had carried out our mission. He prayed that we would play without injury, that we would play by the rules, that we would make those proud who were supporting us. Strangely, he also prayed for the other team. He prayed that they would play by the rules, that they would play without injury and that they would play their best so that when we beat them, we would know that we were not just lucky but beat them even though they were at their best. These words truly inspired me and changed my relationship with the Good Lord. My coach let me know that it was my responsibility to be thankful for the talents that I had received and it was my responsibility to use them to the best of my ability. So instead of praying that I would make a good block or a good tackle or to catch a pass, I no longer would place that responsibility on God. I realized that I am on my own to do my best and, if I did, the outcome would be a result of my own effort, not because God made the block or the tackle or the catch. This was a lesson that I carried through the rest of my life. A few months before my coach died, I went to see him and told him that after all of my religious education, he and he alone was the person who taught me how to pray. This tough old codger had tears streaming down his face as I told this to him.

I spent 3 1/2 years in the Navy after I got out of college. This involved a highly intensive activity because I had very significant responsibilities both at sea and in port. Of course, at sea we had no capability of going to Mass but I was able to pray to some extent, although even that was limited. Between our two cruises overseas in the Western Pacific, in 1964, we were in San Diego for about seven months. During this period of time, I joined a parish there and participated in reading the Scriptures during Sunday Masses and helped out in other small things that I was capable of doing. But all in all, my religious fervor while in the Navy was pretty scant.

In August 1965, I was discharged from the Navy and, one month later, I began law school. During much of the time in law school, when I was at the law school late in the day due to either classes or study periods, I went to Mass at the Newman Center at 5:00 PM before coming home for dinner. This was a new experience for me as Vatican II had occurred several years earlier and the Mass and other aspects of Catholicism had been modified. This also occurred on Sundays as my family got a big kick out of me going to Mass with them carrying my old style missal when everything had changed. I gradually got into the new way of doing things but continued to attend Mass from time to time as well as I could. As an adult, things were a little more difficult in practicing my faith than they had been as a child and young adult where I had a pretty well regimented schedule.

After graduating from law school, in September 1968 I got married in a Catholic church. Susan and I lived in the Northland area and I returned going to daily Mass as much as I could. However, as children began to arrive, schedules got to be more complicated. I guess I would say that I could not practice my faith as well but the fact was that I probably could have maintained the same level of commitment to my faith that I had always had but I just did not get it done. I would say that I was exhausted a good portion of the time when the children were first born.

As the children entered their educational experience, they did not go to Catholic school and they were not all that happy about going to the weekly instructions about Catholicism. It is easy to understand that after they had spent all day in school they did not want to go to another school when they would like to have some free time with their friends. There was heated discussion about this at the dinner table and their mother was opposed to them going to these religious instructions as well. I have to accept full responsibility for caving in on this issue and my family at large stopped having any commitment to any faith whatsoever, including me. As a result, I failed to perpetuate in my children the great Catholic faith that had been passed down to me from at least two earlier generations.

I have kind of lost track as the years have gone by. All I can say is that, down through the years, I attempted to attend Mass from day to day and, strangely enough, never went to Mass on Sunday, having the convoluted idea that I went to Mass during the week and only the dumb people went to Mass on Sundays. These are the types of things that go through your mind to justify misconduct and I was certainly guilty of that.

During this period of time, from about the middle of the 1980s when I was in my mid-40s, I continued to pray about life and the role I was playing in the universe. There were significant times though that did occur that stick out in my mind. One time around 1987, I proudly stood in my bedroom on Goldenrod, bragging to myself at how perfectly I was living my life and, no matter what happened, I could conquer any adversity and not even God could do anything to hurt me. How crazy was that!

Well, I learned my lesson. Within the next three years, my divorce became final, fracturing my family structure, a painful experience; one of my employees attempted to steal my entire business and was one third successful in doing that; all three of my children got in one difficulty or another; I developed a neurological condition that was very painful which caused physical dysfunction; and I became distraught at how difficult my life had become. One day, in August 1990, I was on the point of blasphemy. I was yelling at God saying that He had a grudge against me, that He was doing everything He could to hurt me, that He was doing everything He could to destroy my life, and I had had it with Him. So just go ahead and hurt me as much as you can today; I know you are going to destroy everything that I'm trying to accomplish and just go ahead and let me have it. So there. Well, he granted my wish. My stepbrother, David Crader, was killed in an accident at his army base. Well, that sure gave me a reason to shape up.

I prayed very fervently to God saying that I now recognized that He was in charge. That I was helpless in guiding my own life. That I was flat on my stomach with my face in the dirt and His heavy foot was on my neck holding me down. I said that I had no ability whatsoever to accomplish anything unless He would at least let me lift my head up, gradually rise from the mud and help me by guiding me through the rest of my life. After that, things started to improve in my life dramatically.

My spiritual development between the middle 1980s and the late 1990s is the subject of another essay entitled "Mother." After I spent two weeks with the Missionaries of Charity, my full-fledged fervor about my faith dramatically improved. I continued to go to the Missionary of Charities’ missions in New York City to work at the soup kitchens among the homeless. I also went on a pilgrimage to Europe to visit both Fatima and Lourdes where the Blessed Mother had appeared to children, Bernadette in 1858 and Lucy and her two cousins in 1917. As a result of that pilgrimage, my soul was transformed and was on fire. That pilgrimage took place in April 1999. During the summer of 1999, every morning at Mass for two weeks all I could think about was Lourdes. I started thinking that I was receiving a message that I was supposed to go there. I did go there for one week in October 1999.

After a grueling trip, upon arrival in Lourdes, I was very hungry and very tired. It was late afternoon or early evening. My hotel room was very small, containing a bed and a bathroom. I lay on my bed looking at the ceiling saying to myself: "How stupid can one person be. I can't speak the language, I have never been here, don’t know anything about this town, I don't know anyone here, I have no idea why I would do this to myself!” I was hungry, actually almost starving, and went to a little café down the street. I could not read the menu, even one word, the waiters knew no English, and all I could do was point to a picture on the menu. The Lourdes' experience is one that deserves an essay all by itself but, suffice it to say, it was a wonderful, inspiring experience which enhanced my spiritual life to a great extent. I returned every year for eight years working with and supporting the sick and injured pilgrims, and learned so much about how to assist people that are less fortunate than we.

Six million people per year come to Lourdes for prayer and healing. Some are desperately ill, crippled, either physically or mentally. Most are accompanied by family or close friends or sometimes are simply escorted by volunteers from their homes to Lourdes, when we take over for their care. In the 160 years since Bernadette experienced the appearance of the Blessed Mother, thousands or even millions of pilgrims claim to have been cured in one way or another. However, only 66 cures have been certified by the Catholic Church to be valid miracles. This requires a rigorous examination by medical experts, theological experts, and atheists who examine all of the evidence before proclaiming that a particular cure was in fact a miracle.

Reviewing what I have written above, I have to question whether I have really provided the information that was requested. An objective observer would have to inquire as to what role has the Catholic faith played out in the life of Dan Connor. Like all lives, there are starts and stops, ups and downs, and sometimes we even get sideways without intending to. While my commitment to the faith was sometimes more intense than at other times, however, throughout my life, I have always felt that I was Catholic, I prayed almost daily for almost 80 years and I acted out my faith by going to church and receiving the sacraments when I could. I also feel that I had been the recipient of certain spiritual directives that kept me on a reasonably correct track. From time to time I received what I believe was spiritual guidance. Sometimes I was a little slow to pick up on it but usually, if the messages pounded hard enough on my little brain, I finally figured it out. Also, throughout my life I have experienced what appeared to be negative or even disastrous situations but, in actuality, most everything turned out for the better.

At St. Patrick's, I attended 7 o'clock Mass daily for decades of my life. There was a family, a mother, father, and nine children who were there each and every day at 7:00 AM. The children ranged from high school down to pre-kindergarten but they were always there praying fervently. Can you imagine the effort required of those parents to get that entire family to Mass each and every day for many years? There is no doubt in my mind that those children will live out a strong Catholic faith. If I have one major failing in my life, is that I have not taken the time or the effort to infuse in my children the faith that was handed down to me by my parents and grandparents. That obligation, I guess, required more commitment and/or more effort than I was willing to give. If there is one significant thing that will need to be explained when I face the Good Lord, it will be that particular failure.

Every day of my life, I have thanked the Good Lord for my life and for the great things He has done for me. I have begged Him to infuse in me the grace to understand the mission that He has designed for me and the strength to carry it out to His satisfaction. I have much to be grateful for, especially being blessed by three first class children who, in spite of my failures, have achieved five star successes. Without my great Catholic faith, none of that would have been achieved.