I will wait

Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of
the season of Lent, the day when ashes are placed on foreheads, and the
words “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return” are
proclaimed.  For whatever reason, throughout my life, I have rarely
needed this reminder.

The precarious and fragile nature of
human life has always been very apparent to me, even as a boy.  For as
long as I can remember, I have wondered and worried about aging and
disease and gradually fading into disutility, irrelevance, and decay.
 For as long as I can remember, I have hated this prospect.  Sometimes,
in my more grimly perverse moments, I find myself thinking of my life as
the little bar on the bottom of a video or a song that shows you how
much time has elapsed and how much is still to come.  “How many minutes
are left in the song?” I wonder.  I have always had an acute awareness
that my days are numbered—that all good things come to an end, that
nothing important is permanent, that the things we most hunger for as
human beings are destined to elude us here.

So Lent is here and I am supposed be reminded of my mortality, and, according to the lovely Christian Seasons calendar hanging on my wall, “to draw closer to Jesus, who leads us through death to life.”  Very well, I can do this and I will
do this.  I will do my best to discipline my appetites, to reflect upon
Christ’s passion, to dwell in the narratives of the Gospels, to
celebrate each Sunday foretaste of the resurrection that is coming on
Easter Sunday.  I will prepare for the holiest, most joyful, and
desperately necessary time of the Christian year.  I will wait.