7 Quick Takes

There was this blog post format a few years back on several blogs called "7 Quick Takes" where on Fridays, participating bloggers would talk about 7 things that had happened or that interested them during the week.

No idea if anyone else is still doing it, but I always found those post fun to read, and they seem like they're easy to write as well. Thought I'd give it a go.

 Even though it's not Friday. What can I say? Rules are meant to be broken.

1.) Notre Dame. 


It's so odd how you can not realize how something has had such a big impact on your understanding of the world until you see it burning.

Ironically enough, I heard about the fire from a loved one deployed in the Middle East. He had happened to see it on the news. I started following news updates on my phone. I was sad, but in a general, anxious way, not in a bawling my eyes out way.

That didn't change when I saw the initial Parisians reaction. Images and video clips were of people standing in stunned silence, or gasping in shock as the roof began to collapse. Very sad and upsetting, and I empathized with them, but I was sad only in a removed way.

But then, something happened. A bystander captured a video of a few people kneeling by the Seine river facing the Cathedral, and, rosaries in hand, singing hymns to Mary (the patron and namesake of Notre Dame).

When I saw that, I saw myself in them. This was something I understood, something that transcended our cultural and linguistic differences. These are my people, and that was my Mother's house burning too.  My eyes filled with tears.

A few hours later, I saw more news coverage of the crowd. The few initial singers had been joined by a few more, than a few more, until the entire riverbank was crowded, filled with Parisians singing songs to Mary and praying late into the night as firefighters fought to contain the blaze.

 I started crying again.

It seems so ripe for symbolism that this happened on the first day of Holy Week, to a landmark beloved to Catholics the world over, in a country that is known to be losing its connection to God (as is much of Europe). France's churches have been standing empty, her people mostly removed from this part of their heritage and soul.

Yet, when Notre Dame caught fire and its spire fell, Paris remembered her roots. There's an immense amount of beauty, and even a sliver of hope, in that act of remembering, tragic as the circumstances of it are. It helps us remember and rediscover our common root too.

2.) The reason I haven't written in awhile-- I finished a painting!! 

Every year, I enter the art contest for the Pro Life Women's Conference. I'm not particularly talented, but I enjoy the process of creating a painting. It does take a lot of the- baby-is-finally-asleep time I usually use for writing though, hence my absence here.

Part of the reason I enter it every year because I'm pretty limited as to what I can do for the pro-life movement right now. (Ironically enough, it's more difficult to volunteer to help save babies once you've had a couple babies of your own). I write about pro-life issues occasionally, donate to local charities that help expecting mothers and mothers of young children, and I enter this contest every year. That's about the extent of it.

Hopefully I can become more involved in the future, once my littles get a bit more self-reliant, or I magically become better at managing my time (a girl can hope! Or as I sink ever deeper into denial of her limits as a human being...whatever translation works best for you 😛).

Once I can, I'll be sure to share a picture. (I'm not supposed to share my entry until after the winners have been announced).

3.) I'm trying a fancy Easter bread recipe this year. 

It involves hard cooked dyed Easter eggs, a bread braid, and sprinkles.

Finished result should look something like this.

Fingers crossed.

4.) We're Skipping most of the Triduum masses this year 

I know, I know...now I have to hand in my 'good Catholic' card.

Hopefully our family will be at a point where we can attend Church three days in a row next year, but we're in a "Mass is a foretaste of Purgatory" phase this year with the kids, ESPECIALLY when it's an evening mass.

On Sunday mornings, the older one does ok with a coloring page, but the youngest has started escaping the pew whenever she can and sprinting down the center aisle towards the altar whilst giggling like a crazy person, or trying to steal her brother's crayons (thus prompting howls of deep betrayal and dismay).  We've become quite entertaining to whoever ends up sitting behind us. When it's an evening mass, you're also contending with tiredness and crankiness at the routine being upset. Those are the masses where emotional toddler Chernobyls happen.

So instead, we'll be trying to observe Holy Thursday and Good Friday mostly at home and limit mass to Easter morning. It won't be a perfect or ideal observance of the season, but that hasn't stopped us before. 

In that vein...

5.) This Thursday, I will cook lamb for the first time in my life 

We're going to try to talk about Passover (totally using a Prince of Egypt clip off of YouTube for this part) and have a seder-ish meal on Holy Thursday, and maybe show the kids a clip of a movie depiction of the Last Supper (Anyone know of a good Last Supper depiction that doesn't include a blond Jesus with a British accent, heresy, or isn't intercut with rated R scenes of Christ getting tortured to death?).

In preparation for this, I went to the grocery store to buy lamb. Nothing else is going to be authentic, but, darn it, the main course at least should be.

Holy Ewe is it expensive!! I ended up getting the cheapest cut I could find, which was the 'lamb breast' and about $3.50 a lb. The other cuts were more like $8- $10 a lb.-- we're talking $50 for a decent-sized hunk of meat here.  Definitely NOT becoming a regular part of our diet. Next year, I'm saying heck with it and using cabrito (baby goat for y'all north of the Texas Hill Country).

6.) I found out something really weird and kind of disturbing today

I was listening to a talk by a Biblical scholar (you know, the type on those CDs you sometimes find in the back of Church.)

Apparently, in Jesus's time, everyone got their lambs for Passover sacrificed at the Temple. The priests would kill the lamb, bleed it out, then stick a couple wooden skewers through it for carrying-- one alongside the spine, and another through the forelegs.

So around Passover, in ancient Judea, you'd see a bunch of dudes walking around carrying bloody, crucified sheep.

How's that for a Good Friday mental image?

7.) I'm very glad that Lent is almost over. 

I miss Facebook.



That's all folks! What are YOUR 7 quick takes?