Lenten In The Morning

Lent was not on my radar this year. Not that it’s ever been big in my life. In fact, I had my first Lent in 2003 just months before entering the monastery. That year I gave up children’s books - my most persistent addiction. I wanted a clean wind to blow through the space left by giving them up. Which actually happened.

A good (Catholic) friend said that Lent was a chance to identify one thing that kept you from God and practice changing it. This might mean giving up a habit – like addictive reading. But it could equally well mean adding one – like walks in the woods.

Lacking reading distraction during my first Lent, I entered a sort of spiritual hermitage. Traditionally hermits lived in stark places. This one had the reverberating emptiness of the high plains: miles of prairie under an arching sky with a strong wind blowing. Unbroken from horizon to horizon, the prairie sky is the presence of God, and that wind is God’s breath.

But let’s face it. Hanging out in The Presence is as terrifying as it is exhilarating. Which explains why I generally opt for avoidance activities over paying attention.

Still, that year I lost myself in Presence and by Easter felt all shiny fresh and clean.

This lasted about 3 months. Then I realized I was but a month from loosing my independent, worldly life (I thought) forever. Ack! I dove into children’s books and hid. Occasionally, I’d come up for breath and putter a bit at packing, then dive under again. Of course, I did finally manage it, letting go of my job, home, car and stuff (imagine dumping a fifty-years’ accumulation of books, clothes, furniture, dishes and jewelry, not to mention a huge doll collection).

So. All in all, my first Lent was pretty great. Lent in the monastery was also pretty great, although by then I was a novice and the cracks were showing.

After I was kicked out, I was just as heartsick for the liturgical year as I was for the Liturgy of the Hours. But it hurt to touch and so no Lent.

Things are better now and I decided I might as well mosey on down to the monastery and get my little thumb print of forehead ash. But I had no idea of doing anything for it.

Well…

We had a monster ice storm + blizzard on Ash Wednesday. The monastery closed along with almost everything else (except the idiot university). But I got a call from my friend with the idea that Lent is about getting to God not giving stuff up. She explained her reasoning and we read a couple of the lectionary pieces together.

Then I knew.

A confirmed night-person, in the monastery I struggled to drag myself out of bed by 6:30. But I liked how it felt so ever since, I have tried - absolutely unsuccessfully - to continue this. My latest attempt was a New Year’s resolution: “My day starts at 6:30.”

Which failed.

So for Lent, my day starts at 6:30. And this time, it has actually succeeded. Not that I’ve gotten out of bed at 6:30 every day but more than half so far, and every day has started earlier.

Practice. Practice. It is enough.