June 6 While Falling Asleep...

Before I had my Power Ranger action figures, I had to improvise. In my grandmother's upstairs bedroom, she had a small statue of Jesus: white robed, red scarf, long brown hair and a pale-white face. Without real toys of any kind or my Legos, I used 'our savior' as the good guy in my dramatic fights.

My grandmother went to church all the time, and always told me about Jesus. How I should pray every night, go to church every Sunday, thank god for everything I had. My grandfather never went to church with my Aunt Steffie and grandmother on saturday nights, he watched mass on television every morning before The Price is Right came on.

I tried to take the example and do all the things a young catholic boy should do, after all, I did go to religion class on Tuesday nights to learn how God wanted me to behave, learned about angels and the devil, communion and confession.

However long I tried to follow the rules and suggestions of the priest, it never seemed to stick. I remained too busy on my Legos and the important events surrounding the hero of my adventures, Johnny Thunder. Riding my bike and playing with my neighbors across the street took up a lot of my time as well. After all, I noticed fairly quickly that most of the people I saw in church were old white-haired men and women. I'd have time for praying, now wasn't it. I'd have plenty of time to make it up.

Religion gave me my first 'bad guy,' in the form of the devil. I heard during some of the Sunday morning services about the story that Satan (apparently 'Devil' was only his nickname) had been an angel at one point. The seriousness of his betrayal and what that meant for mankind was always stressed by the sweaty, angry looking priest. No one, though, could ever give me an accurate description of what the devil looked like. I even heard that he changed form if he wanted to sneak around or trick people, so he never had a set form. He looked like whatever he felt like.