I got my shots, two of them, but I still expect people to wear a mask. The vaccine is expected to be good for nine months, and is not 100% effective.  I expect to be 100% effective, despite my age.  I don’t recall what I’m going to be effective about, but that’s the privilege of age.

It’s mostly for others that we wear masks.  It’s for others that I wore a tie and jacket when I started work back in 1961, and my students were in no danger of a coronavirus.  Some of us still have to learn that in Western Civilization we do things for others, like the adolescent Salutatorian who wants to wear a Halloween costume to give her speech here on Long Island.

So she was mentally ill at one time.  She’s still under the tutelage of parents and teachers.  Where’s their common sense, their age-earned wisdom?

Balancing my checkbook is no longer a strong point.  But let the bank beware; any shortfall in my account is attributed to the bank.  I recently paid a few extra dollars to get national park pictures on my checks, and was sadly disappointed.  The pictures had to be weak washouts in order to make the pen script visible by contrast.

Speaking of contrast, I’ll forever have to appear weaker than I am in order for my students to appear stronger.  Just recently they razed Nicky Contra’s restaurant and motel near where I live.  It had been in litigation for years while Nick abided in Sing-Sing for financial crimes against his fellow Long Islanders.  Nick was a former student of mine, upright and teachable, but things went wrong.  There are some mysteries of human nature that took a colossal effort from the Son of Man to atone for.

Do find out that divine intervention averted some fantastic, not necessarily crimes, but mistakes on my part.  I owe much to the seemingly accidental acts of God.  For that I am forever his debtor.

Sister Jeanne, 101 years old, sits next to the Loyola bench every game and prays for their success.   If the outcome depended on prayer alone, she’d be indispensable.  But she probably makes a difference on chancy plays.  Who can tell, other than the coach?

She’s retired, of course.  But you never know; those superiors in the religious orders sometimes demand their pound of work.  People don’t join the religious life for a vacation.

The Loyola team has assurance in these Covid times that regardless of their performance, they’ll always have one fan.  And that can spark a team.  I don’t doubt her prayers are answered in a way she’d prefer.

The NCAA semifinal between Gonzaga and UCLA was one for the books.  It was the first time there was an overtime in a semifinal since about 1977.  In the beginning, Gonzaga was always about two points behind.  I said, “Lord, is this any way to treat a Catholic school?”  The game continued.  During the overtime, Gonzaga led by several points.

Then UCLA tied it up with about five seconds left to play.  One of the Gonzaga players (I don’t know his name) took the ball to midcourt and shot.  The ball went in the basket and the game was over.

Can you just hear me, a month from now, “My prayers never get answered.”  Isn’t that the way of us mortals?

We got up early Holy Saturday morning, for my wife was determined that Paula, my daughter-in-law, wouldn’t have to cook this Covid 19 Easter.  Yesterday she’d ordered food from Phil’s, the local Italian restaurant, and sandwiches from The Village Hero to supplement that.  You can believe it, she was tired when we delivered the goods at 10:30 a.m.  My wife’s eighty-two.

My granddaughter got bracelet construction toys and an Easter basket as we met outside their house, taking due precaution during the pandemic, and had a nice chat in the freezing temperature.  It wasn’t a bad prelude to Easter, when you consider that many are without food and drink during these calamitous times.  It is not enough to pray for them.

But prayer is part of it.  It takes me a little over half an hour to say a rosary, that prayer I say after reading about the apparitions at Fatima, Portugal.