My earliest memory of Mater comes from when I was about eight years old and it was a life-size statue of Mater that was outside the study hall at the Academy of the Visitation. I went there from the time I was five until I finished sixth grade. When I was still six years old, I was promoted to the second grade and at that time we had moved back to the house in the county so I came to school with my Dad very early and had to wait for him to pick me up at 5:30 P.M. I would go to the study hall with the older girls after school but soon was tired of sitting there and would be allowed to go out to where Mater was as there would be another older girl there to answer the phone when a parent arrived below as a few others were sometimes called for after our usual dismissal time. I learned to play with whoever was out there listening for the phone. We would play hide the button and the folds of Mater's dress made great hiding places so I got to know that statue well by feeling in all the crevices and looking for hiding places or trying to find the hidden small button. I also developed a love of that statue as it was life-sized and therefore bigger than any other statue I have ever seen in our many convents all over as other countries often have a whole chapel just for Mater, but the statues are not as big. I then had the grace to be sacristan for the original Mater in Rome for five months and I loved being near to her and think she has been very near to me.
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