A Beautiful Story

By Christine J. Callahan

This story is the history of a woman who dedicated herself fully to the three vocations in her life; first she was drawn to the religious life and became a nun. While very happy with this choice, circumstances at that time prompted a change of direction outside the convent to a successful career in education that ultimately led her back to a full and happy life as a beloved wife.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Dec 5, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462058839

Christine J. Callahan

Christine did not pursue her parent’s wishes to follow her sisters to their college. She was more interested in a glamorous life and perhaps being a secretary to a famous person. That was not to be. She attended a finishing school after high school which led to the rich and rewarding life you will read about her. She lives in Florida in a beautiful retirement home.

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Copyright © 2011 by Christine J. Callahan.

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ISBN: 978-1-4620-5882-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-5883-9 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

iUniverse rev. date: 11/28/2011

To all my friends and nephew who encouraged me to write.

Thanks to Carol Comfort who helped me along with the process.

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The year that I was ready to begin the seventh grade; my father was transferred to the New York office of his company. That meant a move from Virginia to New York. My parents were not too eager for their four daughters to enroll in a school there. My mother was born and raised in upper New York and the property there was still in the family. As a matter of fact, the house where my mother spent most of her childhood was vacant, so the plan to relocate there was perfect. My mother left the town in New York when she finished her education as a teacher and traveled to Georgia to teach school. That was where she met my father. After their marriage, four girls were born in the South and my brother was born after the move to New York. I was the middle child.

In our new school, gum chewing was not tolerated. Like most teenagers, however, we were always chewing in hopes of not being caught. The penalty was to scrape fifty pieces of gum that had been chewed and deposited in the halls, on the stairs or wherever we could find the gum that had been carelessly disposed of if we were caught. In order to shorten our scraping time, we would collect trampled gum and store the surplus in a box in our lockers. We all knew where to find this surplus if needed for the fifty pieces. One day when our supply was depleted, some of us had to scrape and scrape. We were on the stairs laughing and talking when the President of an upper class appeared. He was a model student, an upperclassman and ambitious to succeed. He looked at us and then he looked at me. I felt like a melting snowball and vowed that I would kick the habit, but not right now. This was the first time that I ever saw Dan. I was in seventh grade and he was a senior. I didn’t know then that his thoughts were that’s for me as he looked at me.

We were a small high school and we had about forty students in my class, so we knew each other pretty well. There was a group of girls who had formed a five member club. During the summer, one of the members moved away, so there was a vacancy. I was asked to join the club and given the secret name of our club – DVOT. We were never able to divulge what the name meant nor would we ever want to. This was part of the fun and I doubt that to this day anyone every found out what DVOT meant.

One of my friends and I liked to ride our bikes to the old cemetery and study the tomb stones. Many of the dates were very old, many centuries ago. The town was small then and there was little for us to do after school and completion of our homework. When the snow came and the cold weather set in, we would ice skate or find hills to ride down on our sleds.

One of my fondest memories of