After completing his freshmen year at The Citadel, Pat Conroy goes back to spend the summer with his family. A summer of work is on the horizon for him and his mother has some ideas about that. She introduced him to Father Stewart in Omaha. Enjoy this excerpt from Conroy’s essay entitled “Deacon Summer”:

“‘I’m the pastor of Holy Family Parish on Izard Street, located in the center of the ghetto. We’ve been trying to do outreach programs that will meet the needs of the our parishioners . . . I can give you free room and board. I can’t say the work won’t be dangerous but it will be satisfying. I have three young men from the seminary who’ll be spending their Deacon Summers at my parish. Two nuns will be doing social work. I can offer you a strong sense of community and can assure you that you’ll be doing work that will make the Near North Side a better place. We can offer you . . .'” (61-62)

“I interrupted him saying, ‘I can’t take a salary, Father. Father I come from the weirdest family on earth, and my father won’t let any of us have a paying job.'”

“‘That’s what your mother said. I find it strange. May I ask why?'”

“‘It’s a long story, but father’s something of an asshole, Father. Pardon my French,’ I said. ‘The Depression made him weird.'”

“‘Then consider yourself hired, Mr. Conroy,’ Father Stewart said.” (62)

. . .

“By July I had nearly completed my census of the whole parish when I knocked on the door of Yunca Matkovich. Many of the neighbors had warned me about approaching Yunca, using words like addled, schizophrenic, and crazy as hell to describe her. Though I had come accustomed to people answering the door with revolvers in their hands, I had never encountered anyone like Yunca Matkovich . . .” (67)

“‘May I come in and ask you some questions? I’m taking a census for the Holy Family Church.'”

“‘Please sit down in my living room.'”

“When I sat down in an armchair, roaches scattered across the floor, and I had to compose myself to keep myself from gagging. She had been born in Poland, she told me, then filled out the details of a most unlucky life. Six months ago she had gone completely blind. She’d never seen a doctor because she couldn’t afford one since someone had begun stealing her social security checks. I tried to turn on a lamp  but there was no electricity . . . Opening the door off the kitchen, I saw the outline of the sink and a commode in the lightless room . . . I looked at the black walls, aware only of a secret abhorrence of something staring back at me. I felt a movement in the impenetrable blackness of those walls; then slowly as my eyes adjusted, I processed the scene with a horror coming over me that I’d never felt before when I realized that I was looking not at a color, but a billion-footed colony of roaches . . .”  (68-69)

I enjoyed this essay so much so I am not going to tell you what happens. The rest is up to you. Editor Sonny Brewer will be having a signing and reading for Don’t Quit Your Day Job on Wednesday, December 1st.

Although Pat Conroy will be not be visiting Lemuria for his new book, My Reading Life, we do have signed copies available. Click here to read more about Conroy’s reading memoir.

Click here for other blogs written for Don’t Quit Your Day Job

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