Tuesday, February 08, 2005

you give and take away

to refrain or to add? that is the lenten question i've been wrestling with for the past week. last week i was giving up blogging for lent. that still might be an option, but i am befuddled.

to introduce a small discipline for pink and buck we talked as a family, describing lent and it's purposes. they decided that it would be a good thing to give up ice cream for lent - and we'll celebrate fat tuesday tonight with sundaes and easter with a trip to the store to get any kind their little hearts desire to break their fast.

i already have been fasting ice cream, so it's not much of a stretch for me, and i probably won't be breaking my fast with them in practice, but will be fully participating in the event and watching the joy on their faces as they receive that first bite.

i'm befuddled. it seemed so easy last week - i am taking on walking and reading each morning with liam, i thought giving up blogging would be good to force me to journal and to write other things. i don't really know now. my blogging hasn't been the manic compulsion that it once was, it's settled itself into a tool, and i think a useful one. is giving up a useful tool what lent is about, looking at it i don't think so.

i love the spiritual muscles that are built through abstinence. daily i renew my commitment to my abstinence, those days are linking together into a long chain stretching back over five years now. what muscles are still flabby? what is realistic. that is my prayer, trying to find that place in my soul that stretching will help. that the snooze alarm of abstaining will strengthen. i know when i find it it will fit, it's just that right now nothing seems to 'fit'. well, i guess that's what today is for.

enjoy your fat tuesday!

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