The Nun

I'm currently waiting for my sister to arrive for a visit, and it reminded me of a time I was with her and experienced something I cannot explain.

We live in a small town in South Australia. One evening we decided to take our dog to a walk from our parent's house, around the block to where our grandparents lived. We walked the long way, and so when we arrived on our grandparents' street, it was that odd type of twilight light, which makes everything seem a bit hazy, yet still light enough that things can be easily seen. The street on which my grandparents live is home to the Christian Baptist Church, and so we walked right by the front of this church on our way.

The church was familiar to me as my great manna's funeral had been held there. We are lucky in our town to have quite spacious blocks of land, and this church is situated near the back of the block, with a large car park and lawn and trees scattered around the front- very serene.

As we walked by, I noticed a woman out the front walking between the trees. In the strange twilight she was difficult to make out, but she was a nun, not the typical black and white habit but a green tartan style skirt and veil, the style of dress nuns in our town used to wear, but only those serving the Catholic Church, and they were very unlikely to be in our town at the time, with few modern day women taking on a life of service like that.

There was no car in the car park, and the church was definitely closed at the time, no lights on. It might have been wise to call out to her, at least a greeting, and I would've had to make eye contact, but she did not seem to notice us walk past, and I just had this weird feeling like things were out of place and it wasn't quite real.

My dog did not notice another person, and my sister and I have different versions of events. She says she remembers that walk as we never went that way usually, but swears she didn't even look into the church yard and I did not mention the nun being there. I swear at the time I thought she had seen the nun as well, but I'll accept I'm mistaken, as it just seemed so surreal and so unusual to see someone there at that time of night I'm sure she would've remembered.

We reached our grandparents house and got told off for being out walking so late, and Pa drove us home. We went past the church but no one was there.