This Saturday my sister, Sister Rosa, SSJ moved back to St. Augustine to take a position at St. Joseph’s High School in St. Augustine.  She will be living at the Mother House, a convent in St. Augustine, Florida

I went to ILS to help her pack and also to have breakfast.  When I arrived, I saw Coach Grosso.  He was very happy to see me.  I started thinking back to 1986.  Rosa had decided to join the Sisters of St. Joseph.  After several years as a sister, she was going to take her vows.  The first time one takes their vows, they do it at the home parish of the Sisters of St. Joseph, St. Augustine. The second set of vows are taken at the home parish of the candidate.   In Rosa’s case it was Sts. Peter and Paul.

I was at the University of Miami and was finishing something and could not leave early.  So I hurried home.  I hurried so much that I got a speeding ticket.  That is the only time I have ever gotten a speeding ticket.

I went home to pick up Cristina and Lourdes.  We left Elena in care of our babysitter.  We felt a six hour trip to St. Augustine, to sit in a ceremony was too much for a 4 month old baby. 

The whole family was going on road trip.  We were going in several cars, three I think, but there may have been more.  At this time there were no cell phones.  The cars could not communicate with each other while on the road.  Carlos was driving one car.  In his car was mom, her twin sister, tia Maria and dad.  When dad and mom dated, many times Tia Maria was the chaperone.   To them it was probably  like the old days.  In my car was Lourdes, Cristina, and one of my siblings, but I do not remember which one.  Tia Maria had travelled from Bogota, Colombia either for this purpose or the event was planned around her trip to Miami.  She could only visit once every five years or so to see the family.  Whenever she was able to get here, it was a special time for us.  I miss her.  Come to think of it, I miss everyone in that car.

I decide to follow Carlos to St. Augustine.  We fold out the map and plan our trip. We began the trip, it was fun.  Cristina behaved, she was three and a half years old.  As I follow Carlos, somehow he lets me know he needs gasoline.  He decides to get off in the first exit available.  I follow him.  We realize that the exit is the beeline expressway.  There are no gas stations in the area; at least there were none at that time.  Carlos and I stop on the side and decide we need to turn back, my mom was nervous. Both of us carefully make a U- Turn across the median and get back on I-95.  Somehow we find gas. 

 The whole family arrived at a little motel in St. Augustine.  I remember talking to Carlos and just hearing what I call the most beautiful sound ever.  The sound when your parents are together laughing hysterically and they look and sound like children once more.  They were talking about the trip.

While driving when they first realized that they were about to run out of gas and there were no gas station, mom said “coño!”.  This was unusual to Tia Maria and Tia Maria would says “Pero Rosa” in a disapproving but kidding tone followed by a sign of  the cross.  Dad would laugh. Tia Maria would say  “Pero Rosa”  because she was kind of shocked that her twin sister would say that word.  Mom would not realize why dad was laughing so much.  They kept driving.  When it became certain that they were running out of gas, mom says: “coño!”.  Tia Maria would say “Pero Rosa” followed by a sign of  the cross.    and my dad would laugh.  This kept repeating itself.  When they were taking the illegal Uturn across the median mom said “coño!”.  Tia Maria would say “Pero Rosa” followed by a sign of  the cross and my dad would laugh again.  I was not in the same car but,  I remember them telling me that story and laughing, all of them with full bodied laughter. I remember that so vividly.  I would love to hear that just once again. 

We went into the room, and I believe we ordered Pizza.  Cristina became nervous and had a meltdown.  She wanted to go home.  I remember just lying next to her, sleeping beside her so she would calm down.  She did.  All of us fell asleep.

The next day when we woke up and got dressed we went to church and later had breakfast.  It was surreal. 

All of the sisters from grade school and high school were present.  It was one of those “This is your life” moments.  The strange thing was that all of them had different names.  Sister Anselm was now Sr. Margaret.  Sister Denise was Sister Elizabeth.  Sister Louise Angela was there.  Sister Ann Raymond also.  I am now forgetting who was there but all of them had different names.  I think back on it and feel like I was in an episode of the twilight zone.  Sr. Theophane was present but remained upstairs, and there were three sisters Theophane.  I spent most of the time chatting with these ladies and kind of getting to know them at a different level.  I remember I was having a hard time with their names.  I had only met Sr. Anselm after Ms Flynn left the school.  I do not know why she left.  She was handling 57 students, my fifth grade class.  The class really was out of control.  Sr. Anselm took her place and later on I would think of her as The Fixer.  Whenever she wanted to move you she would grab you by the skin just above the back of the elbow.  It hurt. All through the time I was speaking to her I would keep massaging the area just above my elbow.  Several of these ladies would walk in the afternoon by my house and since we always had a game going on, they would join us for a game of volleyball, or badminton. I would always think Sr. Louise Angela as the lady with the clicker.  I kept looking for other sisters from the past.  Some of them were now elderly and did not come down from their rooms.  I wanted to meet Sr. Agnes Therese but she had left the convent.  Rosa recently told me she visits the convent every now and then.  It was the same with Sr. Jacinta one of our sixth grade teachers (for 6-1), she had left the convent.  I am not sure if the Huber sisters were there or not.   The problem is that the sisters are difficult to track down.  In 1974 they all had an option of whether to return to their actual name or to continue using their “adopted’ name. 

Throughout the ceremony, I just remember looking at mom, and dad and Tia Maria and how proud they were of Sister Rosa.

Fight on LaSalle

 

 

Lourdes and I lived in married student housing at the University of Miami.  We had our first child while living there, Cristina.   It was a wonderful apartment.  The apartment had no air conditioning, so we had to leave the windows open.  It was very warm.  It was termite infested.  It was a wonderful place. The apartments were built in 1926 or so, surrounded by a nice playground.  Sometimes the swing sets had swings.  That did not mean a thing.  It was a wonderful apartment.   Right across the playground, there lived a trumpet player.  Every afternoon you would hear the trumpet player playing beautifully, practicing.   Every time I hear a trumpet playing a solo, I am reminded of playing with Cristina in the playground with no swings. I loved the place, not only because it was our first home as a family but due to many other attributes including my fellow students who also lived in the complex, and it was cheap.  Oh, and we were right across from the Howard Johnson’s on US1 across from the UM.  From our bedroom, I could see inside the lobby of the Howard Johnson’s. 

In many ways those were difficult days.  Lourdes had finished medical school.  She was in residency at Mount Sinai Medical Center.  Cristina was still very young, she was still in her crib asleep in the same bedroom we slept.

It was a great place to walk with Cristina once she was old enough.   Of course, a couple of times we had to evacuate the building due to termites being so bad.  They had to fumigate.  Sometimes, Lourdes and I  would walk with or carry Cristina from our apartment to either Haagen Daz or Swensen’s or Howard Johnsons or Baskin Robbins. The key was ice cream.   We frankly just wanted to tire Cristina out so she could sleep soundly. The ice cream was a bonus for her… and me.   

Lourdes was in pathology rotations at Mount Sinai Medical Center.  I was in a postdoctoral appointment in the main campus.  She was going through a program at the Medical Examiners Office.  In this program she had to visit crime scenes with the coroner’s office.  I had a more flexible schedule. 

On a typical day, at 2am after Cristina was asleep, Lourdes would get a call via a beeper provided by the coroner’s office.  I do not know why but it was usually at 2am.  She would call the number.  The conversation would be as follows.  You will pick me up…usual place…ok see you then.  She had to visit a crime scene, usually a murder or suicide. Lourdes would get dressed and leave the apartment at 2am.  She would walk across the street to the Howard Johnsons.  This was the arranged place. 

The police was very considerate. They did not want a young lady to drive by herself to what by definition was a crime prone area so they would pick her up.  She would sit in the lobby of the Howard Johnsons, while I was pretending to sleep in our bedroom.  There was no air conditioning. So, I could hear the police patrol car approach.  From the bedroom I would keep my eye on Lourdes.  The other one I kept on Cristina.  I worried since my wife  was alone at 2am waiting in the lobby of a hotel in the middle of US 1.   No cellphones then.  She would then stand in the corner at the entrance of the Howard Johnsons and a marked police car would approach.  She would get into the car.  If Cristina would wake up, I would try to get her to go to sleep once more. I would then go back to sleep. Since we had no air conditioning you could hear the sound of traffic.  It was a great apartment.  If the termites were swarming, I would turn one light on so they would go to the other room.  Every other day the scene was repeated.  My wife would leave the apartment at 2 am, stand in the corner and be picked up by a marked police car.  I would then try to get Cristina to fall asleep again. This sometimes would take a long time and this was inconvenient since I had to go to work myself.

I often wondered what my fellow students and neighbors thought.  Poor guy, wife leaves the apartment at 2am, returns around 6am and he is totally oblivious to the situation.  And, not only that, she goes to the same place and is picked up by the police at 2 am.  That couple must not be very bright. 

It was a wonderful place. 

I would learn a lot during that time.  Going to the lab in the morning, taking Cristina to the sitter’s.  Lourdes would sometimes return later that morning, or go straight to the Medical Examiner’s Office.  After I took Cristina to the sitter, which in many cases was Lela, I would go to the laboratory to learn all about cobalt compounds.  I was tired before I got there.  On the weekends, Lourdes would take care of Cristina.  I would go to  work trying to do my research. 

Lourdes and I probably learned the most important thing we would ever learn during that time. We learned to be mom and dad.   

 

So here I am again, proctoring an exam. 

Today it is biochemistry exam for aspiring medical students.   I have nothing to do so I think. 

I keep thinking back on how many times I have done this. I remember back when I was a student at the University of Miami.  I was so nervous when taking my first exam in Chemistry.  It was at the Leaning Center, with Professor Henry Hubinger, LC 180 was the room.  I remember the number since I would teach in that room 30 years later.   I was so nervous.  I would always stare straight at the paper.  Always made sure that there was no possibility of anyone thinking I was cheating. All students were crammed together in alphabetical order.  I sat next to someone whose last name was Lopez.  I had Lopez’s on both sides.  My fellow students always told me there was so much cheating.  I was so naïve. There probably was a lot of cheating.  I just was not aware of it.

I kind of enjoy proctoring exams.  There is really nothing to do.  It gives you the opportunity of doing nothing.  To just think.  I like to observe the interaction among young ladies and gentlemen.  A lot of the body language tells you who likes whom, who is interested in whom.  Who is talking to whom.  There is a lot that can be interpreted via body language.  There is a lot of nervous energy which I kind of appreciate.  In fact, when I do proctor, I also get nervous.  That is what really takes me back to that time; the reminder of how I felt when I was taking an exam, almost 50 years ago in Professor Hubinger’s  class at 8 in the morning in LC180.  There are few things that will remind you of a feeling you had. 

Things have changed so much since 1975.  At the time, I remember wanting to buy a calculator.  I was one of the few who did not have one.  I would use my slide ruler.  I was very grateful to Brother Ramon for teaching us how to use it.   I remember he had a wearable one. Howard Moore also had one in Chemistry at FIU.  Another person did not even have a slide ruler.  He just used log tables to carry out the math; another student used an abacus.  I went through the whole semester without the calculator.  The day of the final, I decided to take the plunge and buy one.  My uncle, recommended the Hewlett-Packard HP 15, with gold contacts.  I could not afford that one.  It was priced at $310.  On the day of the final exam, I went to the UM Bookstore and asked for something a bit more economical.  I saw the HP-21 with silver contacts.  It had a sale price of $125.  I thought I got a great deal.  It could multiply, divide and had all the trigonometric functions.  I bought it the same day of the final, not the wisest decision.  I opened the very noisy package right before the exam.  I was happy since I needed to use a calculator.  I remember looking at the first question.   I took out my HP 21, with silver contacts and put in the first number followed by an operation, followed by the second number.  Only one problem…… I could not find the equal sign.  I kept looking for it, there was no equal sign.  I could not believe it.  Laughing to myself I remember thinking: “how much more would it have cost to get the equal sign?”  Luckily, in my back pocket, I still had my slide ruler.  I used it for the rest of the exam.  I did okay.  I do not know why I remember all this stuff. 

I was once proctoring a general chemistry exam as a graduate teaching assistant at the University of Miami.  I was somewhat surprised when one of the students taking the exam, looked just like my dad.   I would always treat him with Usted. I kind of wanted to find out why he was there.   I kind of admired him for doing this.  I would show so much respect.  He really reminded me of dad.  One day I caught him cheating.  He did not remind me of my dad any longer.  I was not judging him; who knows what his history was.  But, he was cheating.

As a professor, the worst experience I had while proctoring was when I taught Quantitative Analysis.  It was the day of the final.  I was going through a lot at the time and did not put in as much time writing a good examination as it requires.  During the exam students were really struggling.  One of the students comes up to me and says: “I do not feel well.”  He was perspiring heavily.  He thought he was going to faint.  I grabbed both his hands and he was cold and clammy.  I sat him down.   I asked him if he was diabetic, he said no.  (I thought he was having a low glucose episode).  I called 2911, the number you are supposed to call at FIU.  Picture a whole classroom of students taking an exam and the paramedics and police officers are in the front of the class, working on one of their friends. Thankfully, it was not serious.  Apparently, the young man was just having a panic attack.  They took him to the hospital for observation and was released soon after.  I was so embarrassed.  I felt that if I had done a better job writing the exam, this would not have happened.  Even now, the police officers laugh and ask me:  Just what did you ask in the exam?  They point towards me remarking, there, that’s the one, referring to how difficult an exam I wrote.   I obviously was very generous that semester when grading the exams.  The student was one of the best students and received an A in the class.  It really was a difficult exam.

I have always liked teaching because it reminds me of how I felt when I was the students’ age, when I was going through what they are going through now.  This was a very enjoyable time in my life. It reminds me of my own experiences.  Now it also reminds me of how different things are.  The phones have made things so different.  Social media has made things so polarized.  Students believe they have mastered a topic only because they can google it to get the answer.  They feel they do not have to learn how to use the slide rule, they do not have to learn how to use a calculator, even one with reverse polish notation.  In my time, students might share notes in order to make sure they have all the material they need.  Part of the exercise was in searching for and understanding  the material. Now all the notes are shared using a classroom management system.  It Is not who you know but what do you have access to.  Students do not have to rely on each other to practice problems, these are provided by the book companies.  I am soon to take a course on Artificial Intelligence provided by the University of Florida.  It is meant to teach us (teachers) how to use AI in our classes and how to look out for students who are using it in their assignments.  With the advent of AI, who knows what awaits us. 

I look forward to it.