When Sr. Janet Brisky’s mother met her father on a blind date on Valentine’s Day in 1948 he told her he worked for NBC. Her mother, from Manhattan, was impressed with his job in the media and only later found out that her future husband, who grew up on a dairy farm in Orange County, NY actually worked for the National Biscuit Company. His career path did not derail their engagement three months later or their marriage in September of the same year. They went on to have three children and were together until Sr. Janet’s mother passed away in 2007 at the age of eighty-two. Her father, age 87, now resides in Florida. Sr. Janet was born in Middletown, N.Y., the first of the Brisky children. While in high school a teacher inquired if she had ever thought about entering the convent. At the time she was busy being a teenage girl but, she said, “I thought I’d give it a shot - that was 41 years ago.” In 1967, at the age of 18, Sr. Janet entered the novitiate of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary order in Newburgh, NY. After three years she made her first vows and took her final vows in 1978. “In the novitiate you studied where you were living,” Sr. Janet said. As a result, she attended four different colleges and eventually gained her master’s degree in religious education in Boston. “Things were different back then,” she said, and she reported that she was actually in the class room teaching just three years after high school graduation and while still working her way through college. She taught at St. Andrew’s in Clifton, St. Mary’s in Pompton Lakes and Burke High School in Goshen, N.Y. In 1985 Sr. Janet was assigned to Saint Joseph Church, West Milford and has been a pastoral associate there since then, working in varied ministries. She visits the homebound, hospitals and nursing homes, bringing the Eucharist to those who cannot attend Mass. She often brings more than that, besides her lively demeanor and infectious laugh. Her “pizza ministry,” as she calls it, brings a tasty treat for those who can’t get out on their own. She also gives, of all things, haircuts on request on her home visits. “I want my hair to look like yours,” one housebound lady said and since Sr. Janet does do her own hair, cutting that was easy. Occasionally, she said, she has to go to a professional to have them rectify her home cut. On one such trip to a salon the beautician, not knowing Sr. Janet’s profession, asked if she was married. On hearing that she was not, and to the great amusement of the prematurely gray-haired nun, she said “If you colored your hair you’d get a man.” Once a month Sr. Janet gathers a group of volunteers from Saint Joseph Church to host a Bingo game at Milford Manor Nursing Home. “My volunteers range in age from three to eighty-one,” she said. She spoke of the kindness and generosity of the parishioners and said that one of the best parts of her job is seeing the interaction between young parishioners and the elderly. She also heads up a music ministry consisting of singers and 10 guitar players, all volunteers, who play at two Masses each weekend. She has a weekly column in the church bulletin called Can you help’ which asks for everything from formula to furniture, or whatever is needed by those less fortunate. “The parishioners are incredible - whatever I need, I get,” she said. Sr. Janet is a member of the Tri-County Clergy Group, an ecumenical association of local church pastors. She is also the vice president and board member of Straight and Narrow, the largest drug rehabilitation facility in New Jersey. As busy as her calling keeps her, Sr. Janet allows time for fitness and fun. She plays golf, tennis and skis with the best of them. She is often seen out walking, sometimes wearing her favorite tee shirt with the logo: Lord keep your arm around my shoulder and your hand over my mouth’. Sr. Janet lives in Saint Joseph’s Convent with Sr. Geraldine Corio, P.B.V.M., who came to the Germantown Road church in 1986 as the Director of Religious Education. Then there is Mady, the convent dog. Fitness-minded Sr. Janet has made a sweet deal-she is the official dog walker, toting up 15 miles a week around the church’s property while Sr. Geraldine prepares dinner. Sr. Janet is well known as an outgoing, dedicated nun but she is not particularly known for her culinary skills. She said that her choice of what recipe to submit for this article had been an amusing topic of conversation around the dinner table for a few days. She did, however, manage to come up with something simple. Three ingredients or less, just the way she likes it. Sr. Janet’s Easy Chicken Boneless, skinless chicken Lea & Perrins Marinade for Chicken Marinate chicken for 10 minutes or longer Grill