I grew up in Maple Shade, New Jersey. Our house was located two doors down from the Catholic Church. I attended Our Lady of Perpetual Help Elementary School. Maple Shade is a working-class town, which is located an hours drive from Philadelphia, Pa. The elementary school is right next door to the church. So, we were within shouting distance from the school and the church. Needless to say, going to Catholic School for twelve years had a profound and long-lasting effect on me as I was growing up.

The high school I attended was Saint Mary of the Angels Academy. It’s an all-girls college prep school. It was located in Haddonfield, New Jersey, which is a town that, for the most part, was inhabited by wealthy families. 

St. Joseph nuns taught me all through grade school except for third grade when I had a lay teacher Miss Norris, and the fifth grade when I had Mr. Mc Elliot. He was the only male teacher I had through twelve years of school. The St. Joseph sisters had a reputation as being strict. And not adverse to using physical punishment if you got out of line or disobeyed their instructions. I had my head knocked against the blackboard more than once. And my hand whacked with a ruler that had a sharp metal edge. Most often, I was caught whispering to one of my friends.

For the most part, I was a quiet child and kept out of trouble. But, occasionally, my mischievous nature would get the best of me, and I would act out. For instance, we had to attend Mass on Sunday at nine o’clock, and all the students sat in the same seats every Sunday.

I thought it was funny to get my girlfriends to start laughing about halfway through Mass which usually lasted about an hour. One Sunday, there happened to be an older woman sitting in front of me, and she had a coat hanger sticking out of her winter coat on the back of her neck. And every time she had to sit down, the hook of the hanger would poke her in the back of her neck. It was just out of reach of her hand, and so she was tortured by the hanger poking her for well over an hour. I thought this was hilarious, and so I pointed at the lady to all my friends sitting next to me in the aisle. And we would all laugh every time the hanger mauled her. We tried to keep the laughter down to a low roar, but we weren’t always successful.

Soon Sister St. Joseph would come sweeping down the aisle to admonish me with her giant rosery that would swing back and forth from her waist to admonish me. And she would warn us that if we better quiet down. And we would someday be punished for our sins. Hell, was the place she assured us would be the place we would end up in for all eternity.

I always felt this was a somewhat extreme punishment for children. And besides, it was a well-known fact taught to us by these self-same St. Joseph nuns that we all had a guardian angel assigned to us after we were baptized. And the guardian angel would protect us for all time. He would be sitting over our right shoulders. And it was his job to protect us from the slings and arrows that life threw at us, and that included Sister Saint Joseph and the threat of eternal fires of hell.

At the time I reached the eighth grade, my class was informed that we would have to take entrance exams if we wanted to continue with our Catholic education. There were two Catholic High Schools in the area. Holy Cross High School and St. Mary of the Angels Academy, an all-girl high school.

After we took the entrance exams, I was flabbergasted to find out that I not had not only passed the entrance exam but did quite well. I was sure that I had failed them. Since almost on a daily basis, one of the dear nuns would inform me of how stupid I was. It took many years for me to overcome my self-doubt regarding my intelligence and start to believe in myself and my intelligence, and rebuild my self-confidence.

Outside of the classroom and when I was on my own or with my friends, I felt confident in myself. It didn’t really occur to me that there was anything I couldn’t do. Even though it wasn’t true, I would often take chances and do things that were unsafe. During the summer, I wanted to go swimming. But the fact was I had never been in a pool or lake where the water was over my head. No one had ever taught me to swim. And yet, when our neighbors down the street had a built-in swimming pool installed. And I was determined that I was going to go swimming in that pool.

The Pheiffers were the only family that had a pool, and I was certain that they were rich beyond my wildest dreams. Of course, that wasn’t true. They were working-class people, the same as my parents. They just had fewer kids in their families. I would often walk down the street and knock at their door. And ask if I could go swimming. I guess I made somewhat of a pest, and eventually, they gave in. And they invited my best friend and me to go swimming in their pool on one of the hottest summer days. I was wearing one of my sister’s hand-me-down swimming suits that were a size too big for me. But that didn’t stop me from going swimming. And the fact that I had no clue how to swim didn’t dissuade me in the least. Mrs. Pheiffer informed me that I should not go into the pool by myself because she didn’t want anything untoward to happen to me or any of the other neighborhood kids.

And so, on that beautiful summer day, I walked down to the deep end of the swimming pool, counted to ten, and jumped in a while, holding my nose into water that was over six feet deep. The water wasn’t heated. And it was a shock when I hit the cold water and sank like a rock to the bottom, which was well over my head. I had no clue what to do. But it was clear to me that I was going to drown. I began flailing my arms and legs, trying to propel my head and shoulders out of the water. I was swallowing the water and gasping for air at the same time.

I started praying for my guardian angel to come and rescue me. I couldn’t imagine what he was waiting for. It was clear I wasn’t going to last much longer. So, I opened up my eyes, and I saw one of the other bigger kids nearby. It looked like Denny Pheiffer. He was several years older than me. And quite a bit bigger. When he got closer to me, I propelled myself toward him with whatever remaining strength I had left. And low and behold, I got close enough to him to grab hold of him around his stomach. He tried to push me off since I was pulling him down. But he soon realized that I wasn’t going to let go of him. And he started swimming toward the side of the pool that was a few feet away.

And after what seemed like an eternity, Denny managed to get the two of us to safety with no help from me. But, I got plenty of help from my guardian angel, who I had been praying two the whole time. It seemed like a lifetime but probably was only a few minutes. I grabbed ahold of the side of the pool, and Denny swam away. I started crying, and Denny’s older brother Joey was yelling for his mother to come outside. Mrs. Pheiffer demanded to know what had happened, and Denny said, “she grabbed ahold of me at the deep end and pulled us both under the water. She almost drowned us both.”

Mrs. Pheiffer said, “are you alright, Susie?”

“Yes, I am. My guardian angel saved me.”

And then Denny just snorted at me and said,” Oh yeah, right. So, how come you were hanging on me and almost drowned us both?”

“She saved us both. And I folded my arms in front of me, which is what I did when I had no desire to discuss something further. In other words, I was done talking. You could believe me or not.”

Mrs. Pheiffer said, “alright, I think it is a good time for all of you to go home. And Susie, you need to learn how to swim before you go into the deep end again. Do you understand?”

“Yes, I do.” And I grabbed my towel and headed home and headed for my house, which was at the other end of the street, two houses down from Our Lady of Perpetual Help church. I decided that after I got changed, I was going to go up to the church and say a few prayers to thank my guardian angel for saving my life.

And that night, before I went to sleep, I said a prayer to my guardian angel. Angel of God, my guardian dear, To whom God’s love commits me here, Ever this day, be at my side, To light and guard, Rule and guide.

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