Lenten Musings...

I celebrated Fat Tuesday in style yesterday.  My style, anyway.  I had a jelly-filled doughnut and venti latte from Starbucks, a Reese’s Peanut Butter Heart, some Cheetos (salsa con queso – new flavor that Will picked out.  Technically, I’m not a Cheetos fan but these are delicious).  We had pancaked for dinner and I made a last shopping stop at the Paisley Polkadot and spent a good hour last night trawling Women’s Fashions on Pinterest and reading some of my favorite fashion blogs.  It was fantastic.  I bought two great dresses at PP with the last of a Christmas store credit which made shopping even more fabulous as it didn’t even cost money and I bid the Paisley girls good-bye for the next forty days!

"The Icon is You" from Icons in Transformation
Exhibit 2011
at Christ Church Cathedral

And, today begins Lent.  I am a Lent embracer.  I don’t want to say, “I love Lent” because it doesn’t really encompass the feelings I have about this most important season of our liturgical calendar.  Easter, I love!  Christmas, I love!  Lent, I accept with the joyful anticipation of a detox cleanse for my soul.  It’s not about demonstrating my willpower over chocolate or cheese.  For me, Lent is a time for reflection and with greater awareness taking steps to redirect focus back toward God from the distractions that separate us. 

Since I was a little girl, I have always practiced giving something up for Lent.  In younger days, it was an act of willpower, a kind of New Year’s resolution revisited.  I’m not sure that giving up candy did much to improve my spiritual life but in retrospect it did make me feel a part of a community that was joined in Christ and helped me to anticipate with fuller joy the Mystery of Easter.  It was good.  In more recent times, my own children have taken on their Lenten disciplines.  Mary Rollins and Will have different approaches to the theology of Lenten discipline (naturally).  One year, Will offered to give up vegetables.  This year, Will has given up soft drinks for Lent.  He was anxious about doing so but fortunately, Easter is the first weekend of Spring Break so technically, he only has to get through Good Friday without a soda.  Oh, and he did take a Dr. Pepper yesterday from his grandpa’s garage stash so he could have his own Fat Tuesday final drink.

I have a friend who is always very secretive about what she gives up for Lent.  I like that about her and I respect that she does that because she is someone who loves to talk things through and ponder life’s challenges with friends (which I also like about her). 

photo from Icons in Transformation
Christ Church Cathedral 2011

For the past decade or so, I have approached my own Lenten discipline with a dual give up/add on practice.  In the add-on category, my intention is to write every day (perhaps you’ll see the fruit of that labor here) and spend some time with a daily devotional and prayer. 

My give-up is fashion.  Marc asked if that meant I was going to wear burlap for the next 40 days.  It doesn’t.  What it does mean for me is that I won’t be shopping, opening emails from my friends at Banana Republic & Boden who contact me daily, looking at catalogs or magazines, or squandering time on fashion websites, or reading fashion blogs.  I may have to stop following Atlantic+Pacific on Twitter, instagram and Facebook.  For good measure, I won’t be squandering time on Pinterest either.   So, yes, I will be wearing clothes for the next 40 days.  I will wear them joyfully and be satisfied with all of the items I already own.  Possibly, I might even give some of them away. 

And, like my son, I’m probably a little relieved that Lent ends at the beginning of Spring Break so that maybe, I can go shopping in Charleston with my sister.  We’ll see. 

Will you practice a Lenten discipline?