PEGGY

Everyone should have a sister named “Peggy”.

Today – February 11^th – would be her 82^nd  birthday – but her deathday – got in the way of that – November 5, 2013.

She was a sister – doubly.

She was our sister – Peggy – to Billy, Mary and myself.

She was Sister Saint Monica as an Immaculate Heart of Mary nun – to so many sisters in that community of Sisters – centered in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

Nuns in her community were allowed some where back there – to go back to their original names.

Peggy stuck with Sister Saint Monica – maybe because she got the nickname of “Saint” at times – and/or because she liked the name, “Monica” – and she had a wonderful niece named Monica – the reason she picked Monica for her nun’s name.

Who wouldn’t like the name Sister Saint Monica?

I’m sure if she had a name – in being a nun – like Sister Mary Aligatious – she would have been back to Peggy on Day 1.

She was a servant – not just because Jesus calls us Christians to be servants – not just because that was part pf the title of the nun group she joined – but because it was her nature. 

A servant ….

[Here's Sister St. Monica with her first class: 69 darlings as she called them in St. Mary of the Mount, Pittsburgh]

As a result, she ended up serving in many places  in Pennsylvania: Williamsport, Pittsburgh, Dushore, Sugar Notch, Scranton,. She was also in Manhasset, L.I. NY, Wilmington, Delaware, Rocky Mount, North Carolina and Verona and Delran, New Jersey.

When stuck, when someone came down with a sickness, Peggy was a piece on the chess board who could easily be moved.

She loved Rocky Mount. North Carolina.  She got me – her brother the priest – to preach a parish mission – in her parish for a week. I could see how much the parish, the parents, and the kids in the school there loved her.

She loved her last job – getting old nuns in the Marywood Scranton area – jobs as tutors for kids of all ages.  It also got her a car that came with the job – not a new one – but a decent car.

She liked Harvey’s Bristol Cream – a party – making Irish Soda Bread – scale models of the tough strong bread with raisons and carraway seeds.

Mary – was always my favorite sister – and I used to love to say that to bust on Peggy – well Mary and I miss her this day.

We have to get up to her grave in Moscow, Pennsylvania, not too far from Scranton – again soon – but not when there is snow on the ground.

There’s more – this is just a little bit – about my sister Peggy – a Saint  - and such a neat person.

Thought I give a little shout out for her today her birthday.

Last night on Bull – Bull’s wife had a baby – and a doctor – a heart surgeon – whom Bull and his team helped in a trial – showed up at the hospital to thank Bull and see their new baby.  The doctor kissed the baby and said something like “The world is  much better today – because you are now on the planet.”

I felt that way about my sister Peggy.

I conclude with my opening comment:  everyone should have a sister named “Peggy”.