Ash Wednesday

The first day of Lent, and I've spent most of it in bed.

Last night I felt the first touches of some kind of throaty ailment -- shallow cough, aches, weariness. This morning, when I'd planned to get up early and do something spiritual, I instead slept in, sore and heavy and thick of throat. I took a nap mid-morning and listened to the children rattling around downstairs, glad to be unsupervised in terms of schoolwork, but otherwise at loose ends, and I didn't really care because I felt too stupid. I read a bit, but from Sherlock Holmes, not Jillian of Norwich as I'd planned for my Lenten reflections.

I don't really mind. If God has sent me a cold to start off Lent, that's the penance he wants me to take on. As I lay in my warm bed under a cozy comforter, I thought of the news article I read the other day about families suffering in Syria because of fighting, driven from their homes in the winter. A man arrived at the hospital clutching his tiny child only to learn that he'd been carrying a dead, frozen little body. I held that little body to myself as I shivered under my blanket, and offered my cold and even my comfort for that family.

How does one offer one's comfort? I don't know, but the Morning Offering we pray each day at our family prayers starts off: "O my Jesus, I offer you my prayers, works, joys, and sufferings of this day." I don't know that I'm joyful at this moment, but if there is ease in my enforced rest, surely I can offer that for someone who has no ease at this moment. If I'm warm, I can offer it for those suffering from the cold. If my life circumstances allow me to be sheltered and safe, I've been given a place of respite from which to pray for others.

And then I might have some tea with lemon and honey, even though it's Ash Wednesday. Swallowing it might be penance enough.