BE-LOATED AND AFTER

I’ve mentioned several times over the last few months that my wife and I have been on this L.A. Weight Loss program thingy. Well, we are now both within five pounds of our goal weights. To date, my wife has lost 46 pounds and I have lost 34.  The folks at the “center” have asked us to submit a before-and-after photo, so I thought I’d share it with you too. We are getting ready to go on “maintenance” which means we can have some actual food pretty soon. Please feel free to send pasta, cookies, cake, or a big greasy cheeseburger.

TR”ASH” WEDNESDAY

For those of you who are nursing a hangover from Fat Tuesday, today is Ash Wednesday, so it’s time to sober up, fly right, and say you’re going to give up something that you know you won’t miss anyway.  That’s right…Lent has begun.

For the uninitiated, Ash Wednesday marks the first day of Lent. Lent comes from the Latin word “Lenten” which means “springtime” and specifically means “lengthen”; which refers, of course, to the time of year when the days grow longer.  The Lenten season is the 40 days prior to Easter and is a period that is to be set aside as a time of spiritual rebirth and renewal. The “Ash” in the Ash Wednesday refers to a medieval ceremony still practiced in many churches in which a cross is marked on the believer’s forehead in either ashes or oil to remind them of Jesus’ death and our own mortality. It’s often observed by fasting which can mean giving up a particular food or anything else that the believer thinks will allow them more time for spiritual reflection.

My church makes a HUGE deal out of Ash Wednesday, and as surprised as I’m sure some of you are, I will be leading our Ash Wednesday service this evening. This service will include three choirs, multiple instrumentalists, the seven Stations of the Cross, a big top, circus performers, and a pony. Ok…I’m kidding about the last three, but it is one of our most elaborate services of the year.

I mentioned earlier the practice of “giving up something for Lent”. The old joke is that people give up stuff they don’t use anyway; kind of like saying Bush is going to give up using logic (sorry, I couldn’t help myself.) I’ve been thinking about what I should give up and an incident that occurred earlier today has brought me to a conclusion:

I was in a meeting at work; one of those meetings that have no real point and drag on endlessly. I was sitting there fuming about having to waste my valuable time when someone said something that I was certain was going to cause another 30 minutes of lame-ass discussion. I made a caustic remark that was so venomous; it actually caused other people in the room to wince.

I apologized, but I went back to my office, closed the door and wondered what caused me to be so mean. I realized that it was simply that I had a real case of feeling superior, which fueled my mean streak, which made me behave like a prick.  If I’m honest, I harbor a lot of attitudes from time to time that cause me to behave in ways I’m not proud of. I think we all have this kind of “garbage” that we allow to muck up our daily lives and our relationships.

So this Lenten season, I’m going to try and give up the “trash” that I’ve allowed to accumulate in my life. I’ve tried to do this before and sometimes the trash has a way of finding its way back from the curb and into the house. Be that as it may, I think I’m due for a good spring cleaning.