Freni nodded, which took a bit of effort, seeing as how she has no neck. “So this is the Clooney bin of which they speak?”

“Of which who speaks?” Gabe demanded, his brown eyes flickering.

“Ach,” Freni squawked, “folks!”

By “folks” she meant just about everyone in our tightly knit community of Mennonites, Baptists, Methodists, and yes, Amish, all of whom shied away from seeking help for so-called mental illnesses. The Lord was supposed to be able to fix what was wrong with us. Sometimes, however, the Devil got such a strong hold on a person that he or she was unwilling to shake his- or herself loose from demonic possession, and again turn to the healing power of Christ. Only then, and this happened very rarely, did one of our own get shipped off to a loony bin somewhere, and usually those folks never returned.

“The word is ‘loony,’ ” Gabe said sadly, “not ‘Clooney’-although our Magdalena -at least the one we used to know-is very found of George. Anyway, Freni, we don’t call them loony bins anymore; it isn’t PC.”

“Personal computers, yah? This word I learn from Magdalena, but now you make no sense.” She wrested free of Gabe’s comforting arm. “This world makes no sense to me.”

“Me either,” said Gabe, his voice breaking.

I spent three and a half months in the West Pocono Home for the Emotionally Challenged. There I was deconstructed, reconstructed, and instructed in the basics of good mental health. But although I recovered to the point that I could be engaged in meaningless conversation, I felt as if I had yet to recover my oomph.

“We need to help her find a way to get her mojo back,” my Beloved said on one of his weekly visits.

“Ya,” my Jewish mother-in law said. “Dis von needs her mo-Jew.” Although Ida was born Jewish, she is now Mother Superior to a convent operated by the Sisters of Perpetual Apathy.

“Ma,” said the Babester, “do you think you can help?”

Believe me, I heard the words. I was just incapable of protesting. When one is in the deepest of depressions, taking any action, even one as simple as speech, is an intense struggle. To step once again into a head-on confrontation with the mother-in-law from you-know-where (Manhattan) was flat-out impossible. My mouth simply refused to take directions from my brain. I may as well have been encased in Plexiglas; at least then I would have made a very comely coatrack.

“Of course, bubbeleh,” Mother Superior said to her son. “Zee sisters und I vill vait on her hand und giant foot. She vill be vell taken care of. Een zee meantime you take wery good care of mine grandson-zee leetle pisher-ya?”

“Thanks, Ma, I’ll bring her right over.”

And he did-just as soon as he was finished retying himself to his mother’s apron strings. In all fairness, gratitude will do that to one, just as much as desperation. I’m sure that if our roles had been reversed, I too might have thrown myself gratefully into the hands of a ready-built support system-or, more accurately, thrown my spouse. Somewhere. I’d rather not say where.

The Sisters of Perpetual Apathy operate the Convent of No Hope, which is located directly across the road from my bed-and-breakfast, the PennDutch Inn. The purpose of this new quasireligious order is to haphazardly assist others in their search for a life of meaningless existence. Complete and total apathy is the depth to which they all aspire to sink. Why make any effort, they preach, if life is just going to kick the manure out of you? In fact, why even care that it does? Just exist! Want nothing, feel nothing, care about nothing and no one, and you will be blessed with an abundance of pain and disappointment, but perhaps not quite as much as if you’d invested any hope in your life. Hope-now that was an ugly four-letter word! And shame on all the potty mouths who kept that word in their vocabularies.

Given the disastrous downturn of the economy beginning in ’08, and the vast number of home foreclosures, a shell-shocked public welcomed the opportunity to go numb. “Novocain for the masses,” one pundit observed, coining a brilliantly original phrase. At any rate, the Sisters of Perpetual Apathy became a huge movement with chapters in all fifty states, and even spawned a corresponding men’s movement called the Brothers of Eternal and Abject Disillusionment.

The convent building is an old farmhouse where my pseudo- first husband grew up. The house was added to several times, and finally the barn was torn down and a huge dormitory wing was built. Because my current, and real, husband still owned the land and the original building, I was given preferential treatment and assigned a private room. I was even assigned a pair of novices to look after me 24-7: Sister Distemper and Sister Disarticulate. Their jobs were to see that I maintained a routine of personal hygiene, and remained well nourished-both physically and spiritually.

One day Sister Distemper was particularly cross with me on account of the fact that I accidentally dribbled marinara sauce down the white starched bib of my guest apron. After lunch, instead of taking me back to my room for my usual nap, Sister Distemper sat me out on the patio to wait until Sister Disarticulate took over from her at the four o’clock shift change. Frankly, this state of affairs pleased me-that is to say, as much as anything could. By then it was late spring, so the weather was pleasant and the air was filled with birdsong.

Just minutes before the good sister was supposed to take over the new shift, a very large pigeon flew overhead and dropped its enormous deposit on top of my head. The back of my head was covered by an organza prayer cap, but the bird’s black-and-white offering landed toward the front; in fact, the more liquid aspect of this unwanted gift had begun to dribble down my forehead and channel into my deeply etched frown line.

That precise moment, the passage of the passerine and the passing of its poop, was like a switch being flipped in my brain. Just like that, I went from a near-vegetative state to the tart-tongued endearing old soul I used to be. I rose from the wicker rocker like a modern-day Lazarus from the dead, threw off the hideous turquoise-and-slime green afghan that had been wrapped around my shapely shoulders, and shook a slim fist at the son of a squab.

“You come back here, you rat with wings!”

Sister Disarticulate was temporarily at a loss for words. “You-you’re back!”

“As big as life and twice as ugly,” I said.

“Whum?” she said.

“Nothing. That’s just something my first husband used to say-except that he wasn’t legally my husband, which meant that we were cohabitating without the bonds of matrimony-oh dear, this must shock you, you being a nun and all.”

“I’m not here at noon. I’m merely a cistern.”

I ran that through my awakening brain. “But nuns, sisters-they’re all the same, right?”

“Gracious, no. I’m not Catheter, nor even Despicable; I’m a Pigeon.”

I pointed to my head. “Nonsense, dear. That was a pigeon; you don’t look anything like one-well, other than your eyes, which, you must admit, are rather beady and your legs… Honestly, dear, you should either request a longer habit, or see if Mother Grand Poo-Bah can make an exception and allow you to wear trousers. If not, the next time you’re in Home Depot, someone looking for broomstick replacements might lunge for your shins. In which case, if you’re not appropriately clad under there, it could be somewhat embarrassing. Delores Klinkhauser forgot to wear her bloomers-”

“No, no,” she cried, in mounting agitation, and then finally her words came out as sharp as the Devil’s pitchfork and every bit as dangerous: “I have no religion; I’m a pagan!”