Once upon a time, Ash Wednesday meant two things.
First, you went to church and had someone make the sign of the cross on your forehead with ashes.
This signified that — as the Catholic church said — “thou art dust and unto dust thou shalt return.” Remember that, all you narcissists out there. You may stand in the mirror admiring your abs now. But in the end, you’ll just decompose into dust like everyone else.
Pleasant thought, isn’t it?
The second thing Ash Wednesday meant is giving something up for 40 days. Catholics were/are big on meat. This has nothing to do with modern dietary discoveries that red meat, while nutritious for lions and tigers and bears, isn’t always healthy for homo sapiens.
Catholics are asked to fast (no meat and the equivalent of two meals) on Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, and abstain from meat every Friday during Lent.
This is just meat, mind you. Fish is OK. I’d imagine places like Legal Sea Foods do a bang-up business on Friday nights during Lent. Ditto Kraft Foods and its easy-to-make — as well as delicious — macaroni and cheese.
If you’re watching your weight, mac and cheese may not be the best option, but it’s so worth it.
At Sacred Heart School, where there were 50 kids in my class, the nuns used to line us up against the wall, execution-style, and ask each of us individually what we were going to give up for Lent. If you want “lame,” you should have been there. How many people were going to give up watching their favorite shows on television? How many were going to stop eating sweets? Or, my very favorite, “I’m going to stop beating up my little brother.” Answer to all of these: no one. I never knew a single 11-year-old who followed through on any of these vows.
It always came down to junk food for me (though it wasn’t called junk food in 1965). Even though my mother, father, doctor and dentist (especially him) frowned upon my junk food predilection, I managed to sneak candy bars and ice cream sandwiches early and often. There was a pizza place across from the bus stop for a couple of years, and I’d borrow money from other kids so I could eat a slice, and then go home and snack out some more.
Every year, I’d be prepared to say goodbye to my verboten snacks the same way smokers bid adieu to their cigarettes: with a mixture of hope and sadness.
Not being a French scholar, I never knew Mardi Gras meant Fat Tuesday until I read it in a book. The idea is to eat, drink and be merry on Fat Tuesday and prepare to pay for it for the next 40 days and 40 nights, the same way Jesus fasted in the desert for 40 days before riding into Jerusalem in time for the most celebrated Seder supper of all-time.
Even without knowing the significance, I followed that script. Pack in as many of those Three Musketeers bars and ice cream sandwiches as you can, Krause, and then hunker down for Lent.
I never did much hunkering. H.P. Hood always came calling sooner rather than later, the same way Mr. Hillshire comes looking for me now. Last year I didn’t even make it through Ash Wednesday.
As I got older, the accent wasn’t so much “what are you going to give up?” but “what about yourself do you need to work on?” One year, I taught Confirmation classes, and asked the candidates to bring in a prop to demonstrate their willingness to make improvements on themselves.
One boy brought in a baseball bat. When I asked him what that had to do with the assignment, he replied, “I’m working on my hitting.” So much for that.
This year, it’s back to basics. One of my co-workers has a candy jar that she generously keeps filled. It’s a tight fit for my hand, and I always joke that one of these days, I’m going to get it stuck the same way Winnie the Pooh’s head got stuck in the honey jar. She has the good grace to play along.
I shall endeavor to keep my paws out of that jar for the next 40 days. Sacrifice and self-improvement. I just hope she filled it to the brim Monday night so I can partake to my heart’s content on Fat Tuesday.
“Gather ye rosebuds while ye may … tomorrow ye may diet.”