On Friday, the 12th, I had the 8:00am Mass and immediately
afterwards I headed to the Port of Baltimore to pick up the
girls (my sisters and two friends) who were returning from
a cruise that went up the coast through New England. They
had a great time with some of Maggie’s classmates from
Notre Dame High School who are celebrating their 70th
birthday this year.
I drove them back to Southern Maryland and then stopped
by Rip’s and met Jim Kehoe, Helen and Sister Mary Newett.
Mary was in town to attend a memorial Mass for her blood sister,
Kathleen, who was the pastoral sister at St. John’s in Clinton.
She died in early September up in Scranton and the parish
wanted to have a Mass. It went very well. Sr. Mary was the pastoral
sister at St. Bernard’s when I was there and is living up in
Scranton in retirement.
Then I drove up to near Hickory for the wedding rehearsal of
Madeline and Chris. I had baptized her 26 years ago and had
married her Mom (Mary Louise Jones) and Dad (Bruce Mulligan)
28 years ago. I got to see all her family – grandparents, and aunts
and uncles and even a young woman, Kathy Gallagher, whom
I knew as a young child. Caught up on her mom, Ann, and other
members of the family. It was great fun and we had a delicious
Italian rehearsal dinner.
I had a room at the hotel with a hot tub and I really enjoyed it.
I watched the Orioles and the Nationals lose and slept well.
Wedding was at 11am and the reception was at the Mulligan’s
farm. They had a tent and great food. I stayed for much longer
than I usually do because it was so much fun and I caught up
on lots of old friends – Julie and Dave! Julie use to answer phones
at the rectory at St. B’s.
I stopped in to see Kathleen and Doug Hanratty on the way home.
He had been in the emergency room for an incident and we just
had a nice visit. Got home around 8pm and went to bed.