In cased you didn’t know, last Wednesday was Ash Wednesday and Ash Wednesday marks the start of Lent. For the record, I got lucky on the ashes this year. Instead of the usual “you’ve got dirt on your forehead,” a man actually asked me where I got my ashes because they actually looked like a cross. A compliment. Ha!
That’s never happened before. Back when I worked at Borders I had a customer (whom I had never met before in my life) try to wipe them off my forehead like they were doing me a favor. Awkward? I thought so.
The inevitable question every year(the one that tags along with the ashes) is: What are you giving up?
Sometimes I don’t give up anything, and when I do “give up” something, I try to make it something that’s actually for God instead of for myself (ex: giving up deserts because you want to lose a pant size=for you). No, it doesn’t always work that way, and yes, like everyone else in the world I’ve given up food items. Perfect I am not. Last time it was pop(yes, southerners, I said POP!), and by the time Easter rolled around I was seriously craving some Coca Cola. (Sidenote: When I finally got to order that Coke, the restaurant we were at gave me diet instead…sheer disappointment)
This year, I decided I would do something instead of giving something up. I decided to give up some of my day to read something religious whether its fiction or non. As a reader, I tend to stay away from the religious reading. A single book a customer made me read several years ago(that I felt I had to slog through to be nice) kind of killed a genre for me. It was awful. Continue reading →
