One thing that can be said about the little friend’s parents is that they were truly the greatest generation. Hardly a day went by at St. Albert the Great where a little friend’s parent was not either on lunch duty, or bingo duty, or coaching, etc. There is a special place in heaven for the Class of ’75’s parents who were not only America’s greatest generation but probably St. Albert the Greats greatest generation. With the little friends now out of Catholic school these parents had no problem signing their children up for the St. Albert the Great Teen Club, a club where good Catholic teens could meet, have fun, and stay out of trouble.
Yes the parents of the little friends were truly America’s greatest generation, however the little friends were not. The little friends saw the Teen Club as an opportunity to expand their “weekend warrior” activities to a week day. The little friends had a plan to stash some brew before the meeting so that after the meeting there would be “refreshments” hidden outside for the little friends to enjoy. The little friends were well underage to drink. In fact, they were underage to even drive. However the design and time of the St. Albert the Great Teen Club would help the little friends stay concealed because they would walk between the two school buildings of St. Albert the Great making themselves invisible from any direction and they could only be seen if someone was inside the two school buildings. Since there is no school in the evening, both buildings would be empty and the little friends could do whatever they wanted unobserved between these two buildings. Once they were beyond the two buildings they would then walk between the Church and the track field which is also nearly invisible from any direction.
Now we are not saying the little friends planned this walk way of secrecy; it was simply common knowledge to anyone who ever went to the school. You cannot be seen if you walk home between the schools at St. Albert the Great. The building to the West is known as the Junior building and hosted children in the 1st through 4th grades, the building to the East is known as the Senior building and hosted children in the 5th through 8th grades. Right in the center was the pride of St. Albert’s architecture, the life size statue of St. Albert the Great himself – the #1 photo op at the parish. The little friends’ plan is executed flawlessly as expected and when the Teen Club meeting is over, the little friends are rewarded for sitting through it with a few cold ones as they begin a slow walk home between the two buildings. Robert comes up on the statue and asks “I wonder how much this weighs?” as he tilts the statue backward to feel its weight. Unfortunately he tilted it a little too far back and could not hold it up. Fortunately he was able to lower it gently into the grass and called the little friends to help him put the statue back up.
The little friends gathered around the statue and together they lifted it back up, but did not support the head and gravity had its way as the head of St. Albert the Great rolled off the body and now laid at the feet of the little friends. The statue of St. Albert the Great was now headless.
A few weeks earlier the little friends had broken a convent window and had managed to avoid complete condemnation for that. Now, at a Catholic Teen Function designed to keep Catholic Teens out of trouble, the little friends had decapitated the namesake of the Church. In addition to the trouble they were now in, there was also the financial aspect to consider. The little friends had not even gotten the bill for the convent window and now they would also have to pay for a statue? A statue that probably cost thousands of dollars!
Once again the little friends reacted by running away, but this time they made it home. Their parents, partially shocked that the little friends came home so quickly, could not have been prouder of their kids who they felt were essentially attending Church on a school night by going to the Teen Club. The little friends spoke sparsely of the meeting, and waited in their rooms hoping that no one would notice the decapitated statue laying on the ground between the schools at St. Albert the Great.
The calls did go out, and St. Albert the Great knew exactly who to call. None of the participants at the Teen Club that night got phone calls except the little friends. And each little friend told a different story. One said it was down when he walked by, another said it was up when he walked by, yet another said he noticed nothing unusual that night. Finally, when confronted with a second call where it was explained to the little friends that all their stories were different, the little friends had little recourse and pled guilty. The only thing remaining was what the punishment would be and the cost would be to their parents.
It was only a day later that the little friends received their fate. They were all to report to the Msgr. This was about as harsh a punishment that St. Albert the Great can dish out. Normally when you have to report to the Msgr. it means suspension, expulsion, or worse. Since the little friends had already graduated from St. Albert the Great they knew the Msgr. could not kick them out of school, but the Msgr.’s power was certainly not just limited to school. There were actually two Msgr.’s in the Heights and they were brothers and were so popular in the community that they had streets named after them. While the land of Oz may have had the witches of the East and West, Dearborn Heights had the Msgr.’s of the North and South.
The little friends gathered outside of the rectory and once again got into their “regret formation” as they were marched into the rectory for what would certainly be the end of their existence. Once inside, the little friends were greeted by the housekeeper who told them to wait in a closed room for the Msgr. The room had just one window and the little friends used that window to look across the parking lot at the nuns convent where only a few weeks earlier they had broken the Nun’s window. While breaking the nun’s window might have been a sin, decapitating a saint must surely be a capital sin and if it wasn’t the Msgr. brothers had the power to make it one. In fact, they might make an 11th commandment just for knocking heads off holy statues and place it somewhere between honoring your parents and keeping holy the Sabbath.
Msgr. came into the room and talked very calmly to the little friends. He believed the little friends when they claimed they were “frolicking” between the two schools and accidentally bumped over the statue. (The truth being that the little friends were drinking between the two schools and wanted to know how much the statue weighed by intentionally tipping it over). Msgr. also said he was concerned with the fact that the little friends lied when the school first contacted them, not catching the whopper the little friends just told him about “frolicking”. Robert spoke up on the lies and explained that they lied because they did not want their parents having to pay a big bill for a new statue. Msgr. accepted this explanation and told the little friends he was going to have the school maintenance re-cement the head to the statue and the cost would actually be less than the window they broke a few weeks earlier. With that he thanked the little friends for their time and the meeting was over.
Once again the little friends had avoided disaster despite leaving a trail of chaos in their wake. A few weeks later the parents of the little friends received a bill from St. Albert the Great for the damage which turned out to be a little less than thirty dollars per family.
The little friends continued their attendance at the Teen Club. Their explanation for knocking over the statue (frolicking on the way home and accidently bumping the statue) was accepted, and the case closed.
