My Rosary Tastes Funny

The fact that I savor Lent with a certain delectation is most likely indicative of a lack of spiritual maturity. To aid in my growth, I am providentially given the Lent I need, not the the Lent I want. Whether it was the pain and drug fogged 40 plus days of two years ago - no Sundays off - culminating in necessary but intimidating surgery two days after Easter or the years when I would mix aims for personal penance with guiding a gaggle of little von Hubens through Lent, the opportunities are obvious.

So what about this year? The payoff is...confusion. Most likely because we’ve reached the point in the liturgical calendar when I expect to see what the payoff will be for me. My educated guess is: “I should stop thinking it’s all about me.” Or maybe I should just stop over-thinking.

Whether talking to my spouse, children or spiritual director, it is easy to characterize things in Simpsons terms. Sometimes I’m a lot of Lisa. Or I’m feeling too much Flanders. Holy Thursday, 2008 - total Ralph Wiggum. Just all over the map. Home life is chaos. Work is often spiritually unfulfilling. (I used the analogy that it is too much like watching sausages made, which is not quite right...but it captures the disillusionment and loss of mystique.) My mind wanders at prayer. I’m still in the grips of some post-viral body inflammation that leaves me hot/cold/achy/irritable/kvetchy. And offering that up would be almost too simple. So I kvetch. My mind wanders some more. I obsess that I’ll screw up something at work...and be “The Idiot Who Ruined Easter.” My mind wanders still more.

Last night I had an uncommon bout of insomnia. (Somnia being my usual problem!) I even succumbed to getting up and treating myself to some 11:00pm Oprah, only to find that it was about Hannah Montana. Blech. When sleep finally came, I had vivid dreams. Dreams in which I had insomnia. I shook off that sleep around 3:00am. A time which would be best spent in prayer finds me moving boxes around my room to get at the hidden Easter candy. Gobbling ill gotten Reese’s cup miniatures while watching a panoply of TV preachers and fitness equipment infomercials augers ill for what dreams may come.

And my mind wanders... Prayers trail off. Penances...

Time to go to the office.
They do let me use scissors.
Maybe I’ll see a leprechaun...