Lent has taken the year off

Not a pancake flipped

I thought about it and then decided we were doing more than our share. Two weeks ago, on Shrove Tuesday, it is not like I could be bothered with pancakes, no one was out for Mardi Gras, New Orleans was as quiet as you could hear a pin drop. That is what life in the times of a global pandemic has become.

It meant the Lenten season would be like we have lived for the past year, in limitations, in privations, in restrictions, too many to mention. To the question, what are you giving up for Lent? I had one answer. Nothing! Nothing more, we already cannot do as we wish or desire, what else do you want us to do beyond this imposed ascetic life?

Half of not much done

Other feasts will come, Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension and Whitsun at the far end of May on the 23^rd and it is unlikely that we’ll be halfway through the tunnel, even if we can see the light at the end of it. The absence of any sound either dissipated by distance or in its realism might just assure us we are not in the path of a fast-moving train with nowhere to escape to.

What I am doing for Lent is really looking for how to recapture the essence of loving life, enjoying work, meeting people, travel, adventure, getting married and dare I say, making love. We all have needs and that is such that Lent might just take a break this year, we’ll be more faithful to the sacraments and creeds in the next.