Goodbye Pussyfoot

Barbara Lokach was a social worker and freelance writer based in Toronto.

Goodbye Pussyfoot is a pleasant autobiographical account of Acadian Millie Gaudet’s six years in a convent when she was a young woman.

Millie Gaudet entered St. Vincent’s Convent in Saint John, New Brunswick, in September 1937 at age 16. After spending the first six months as a postulant, she then became a novice and was given her religious name and a habit. Noviceship was the period of probation in which one “became familiar with the rules and regulations of the community.”

It is the author’s description of these rules and regulations (such as her chapter entitled “Great Silence: Entrance into the Convent”), her occasional rebelliousness or humorous pranks against them, her initial acceptance of and eventual conflict and break with them that in essence comprise Goodbye Pussyfoot. The isolation of convent life from the real world and its subsequent effect, the fact that the nuns themselves were not perfect, and this effervescent adolescent Millie Gaudet trying so hard for whatever reasons to “exceed her grasp” are areas just touched on.

Though admiring the writer’s zest and reverence for life, this reviewer found the book a bit too sweet and simplified. The book will probably appeal more to adolescents than to adult readers.