vitamin c

i've found this easter weekend particularly reviving. walking the labyrinth on friday night, revealed wounds and new paths. it's kind of a shame that we have to wait a whole year before next easter.

the sunrise service by the water was once again beautiful, and the sun arrived right on time. it surprises us every year that it doesn't fail to come up.

my whole family is sick, so they ended up cancelling our easter gathering. this left us with a pot of 12 potatoes and no other food in the house. so brendan invited the cardiffs for a mashed potato lunch where we sat around talking about family dynamics, prison, weddings and the new pope. they in turn invited us to their place for their easter dinner. it turned into a cardiff-lorimer marathon hangout, which was really fun.

shannon, who was feeling nostalgic about her catholic roots, wanted to go to evening mass, so we all went along. i'd never been to a catholic mass before, nor have i ever been in st. mary's cathedral, so it was very interesting and felt somewhat elicit (no doubt my evangelical parents would frown on this with deep disapproval). i don't know if i'd like it all the time, but it was a neat experience and i'd go again. the four of us crammed into a tiny pew (shanno, then b, then andrew, then me) and tried our best to follow along. i'm pretty sure we exposed ourselves as outsiders since we sang with more gusto than the other congregants, but didn't know when to cross ourselves, kneel, etc., AND we just sat there squished together when the faithful went up for communion. my least favourite part was having to breathe in all that strong incense (it made it hard to breathe) and my favourite part was when the priest went around and splashed us all with holy water as a reminder of our baptism. in the baptist tradition i grew up with, you did it once and that was it. i like the idea that it's something to be reminded of regularly. andrew and i were both excited when we felt the drip of water hit us. thankfully i only got the giggles once when i was trying to sing a song i didn't know and kept messing up the words. many of the rituals were mysterious to me, and i was curious about what was going to happen next. when the homily began, i expected to be bored, but i wasn't at all. it was a good little message and i liked how he talked about what pope francis was up to cleaning the feet of the muslim girls on good friday. i'd never really considered how global catholicism is compared to protestantism, which has no central leader or central location. no doubt if i'd grown up with that tradition i wouldn't have found it as engaging. it's interesting to me that my mom moonlights as a pentecostal because it's the exact opposite of what she grew up with, and i could easily be lured into moonlighting as a catholic because it's the opposite of what i grew up with. just goes to show that people are drawn to the unfamiliar.

after mass, we stopped at shoppers so i could buy some candy. as brendan and i watched arrested development, i started to cough (i have this sinus infection and i couldn't breath properly), then threw up all over the floor. just as we finished cleaning it up, i found that i couldn't breath again and threw up once more. the second time it was worse and my foot was right in the centre of it. b handed me some paper towel to wipe my foot but i used to it blow my nose so i could breathe again. it was a crummy and bizarre way to wrap up the easter weekend.

picture's worth a thousand words, it explains why we don't talk.