The problem with blogging is not what to write but rather which thing to write about! I was searching for a recipe last weekend and the result was this “still life”. I said to myself.. now THAT would make a good blog post! My intention was to write about the cookbooks but then I thought perhaps you’d like to hear about my refrigerator adventures or the decoupage of photos on the freezer door. Oh the dilemmas of a blogger…
Thus.. the three chapter essay.
So there seems to be some kind of mistake? Who planned a meatless Lenten Friday to follow a green beered boiled dinner of succulent corned beef and cabbage? What are we supposed to do with those left overs today? One would think that God and St. Patrick would work this placement of holidays and fast days out while they are leisurely sitting around in heaven shooting the bull.
And here lies the dilemma… Last week I made a meatloaf on Thursday and couldn’t eat the left overs on Friday. In the faculty room at Presentation High School we had a discussion about what is worse. Eating the meat on Friday in order to not be wasteful or throwing it out and breaking out the good ol’ frozen fish sticks- reminiscent of our Catholic growing up years? Which is the bigger sin?
We are well into Lent- the Catholic season of 40 days and 40 nights before Jesus is raised from the dead on Easter Sunday. This picture was taken on Ash Wednesday when we celebrated Mass as a school community and learned some important lessons about what it means to be generous and to have gratitude. But mostly we took away foreheads full of ashes in remembrance of our physical bodies having their origin and their destiny in dirt. You heard me. Dirt.
Such disparity in this photo! These young women, so young and beautiful with their bright smiles and hope for the future; their willingness to learn and grow and connect with life! Their hopeful faces smudged with ashes…
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| Peter, Robert, and Patrick |
It is a lazy afternoon in Whittier, California and I am across the street on Tedemory Drive visiting with my neighbor, Mrs. Jenner. She has successfully raised her two sons to responsible adulthood. I stand with my right hip jutting out in a heralding of chiropractic visits yet to come- balancing chubby Peter. Patrick is clenched on to my right thigh and out of my peripheral vision I focus on Robert scaling a nearby tree.
“Oh Honey! Treasure this time! These are the best years of your life!” my dear neighbor advises. I’m sure I looked at her as though she had four eyes. I was a tired, overworked young mom with half read books and have baked friendships. I couldn’t seem to focus on anything in those days besides watching little boys for hours and hours on end. I was thinking more along the lines of “These are the days that try men’s souls!”
There’s no way to begin except to just do it. For a woman who is never speechless I seem to be unable to get going on this blog thing. So here goes nothing!
I am a straight shooter. My son, Patrick, likes to remind me to “filter, mom”. I know. Sometimes my thoughts sneak out of my mouth without due diligence to my frontal lobes. My boss at Presentation told me in a recent meeting that I shoot from the hip and that’s what gets me in trouble. I immediately thought (but held my mouth closed) “Which hip, Mary? My real one or my ceramic one?” Had she forgotten that I had my right hip replaced this last summer? The irony (and the humor!) of her comment was not lost on me.
On that note, people have been asking me “Aren’t you a little young to be getting a new hip?” and “How long will that new hip last?” My thoughts… how long does anything last? What warranties do we have on a breast or an eye or a lung?
I’d rather focus on living life and finding some mischief! I hope you will join me.
