While I had no original plans to write anything about this very personal issue, a few events took place that changed my mind. I went to a little high school in the coal region of Pennsylvania named Cardinal Brennan Jr/Sr High School. It was a strange place. Catholic education echoed through the hallways, along with the shenanigans and teenage laughter of generations forced to wear school…
My Daily Doodle for Ash Wednesday.. inspired by a few things.. First off, it’s inspired by some of my funniest times in life, Catholic High School in the late 1990s. Which explains, perhaps, why my priest image looks a little but like former President Bill Clinton. Slightly.
Also, the joke of having a nice Ash was one used heavily back in the former school Cardinal Brennan High .. Hopefully, if you chose to keep up with this old tradition of wearing your faith like a badge of honor on your head, your ash was as fine as you expected it to be.
So I looked at yearbooks from my past last night. Amazing how much changes, isn’t it? I read some of the words people wrote in my yearbook.. Pages aren’t yellowing yet but they sure feel older than ever..
From yearbooks to Facebook.
The old days to the modern age.
I’d love a chance to relive a few events.. but maybe not all.
I took this photo today as i drove by my long gone high school..
With another cold winter ending, the rebirth of spring beginning, Cardinal Brennan sits there vacant.. On a hill in Fountain Springs, PA..
My alma mater now has simply become a relic.. A closed down school in the distance. Memories are fading.. Lives moved on. But what secrets, I often ponder, does that cold building still hold?
Do bells still ring, and do poets still sing? Does an echo survive of time gone?
It’s been 6 years since Cardinal Brennan began the process of shutting down.. That’s six graduating classes that never finished there and two that never even started..
Last century, when times seemed simpler and I was a high school student, I went to this building.. Now it’s empty and desolate.. It’s simply a aging piece of brick and mortar..
But I suspect, in the stillness of the night, the building’s spirits and past somehow lives. At least I’d like to believe that..
