sr. bernadette

Her habit was bright blue. There was nothing muted about the colour. She belonged to the community "Mariadotrarna" - the daughters of Mary. She had large, dark, plastic rimmed glasses. Typical men's glasses. She did not speak very much English. My Swedish was minimal. She was tall and angular. One of her responsibilities was to ring the bells to announce evening prayer. I always envisioned her racing up to the bell tower to ring the bells. I could see her habit flowing behind her. And she was so quick! One minute she was with us walking to church and the next the bells were ringing. At the end of my 6 months I figured out the bells were electronic. She did not run up stairs to the bell tower. She disappeared behind the entrance doors to the church and hit a button.