ash wednesday

Ashes to ashes, friends, and despite my theoretical love of liturgical time, I went to sleep at 9pm last night, and didn't get ash on my forehead. I didn't have time in all honesty today, and I feel guilty at the thought of going to get a cross of black smeared on my forehead and then not taking communion.

I was frustrated with much of humanity today, be they punkass undergrads or boomer overlords, hypocritical powers that be, posturing rockstars that only talk about revolution when they know it's safe to when they have nothing to lose and look good doing it, but it's not like any of them know or care what I think so why do I bother getting pissy?

But I attempted pad thai tonight for my fellow musicians and it came out beautifully. I can't find my way around the Vietnamese grocery store near me in search of tamarind paste, and whatever I got was whole tamarinds so I had to strain out all the rinds and seeds and the fish sauce smells so bad but when it cooks down with everything else, it turns into something amazing.

I turned my heat off the past couple days because I thought it'd get warmer and I haven't been home but now snow is on its way and now it won't kick on so it's a bit nippy but we were wrapped in blankets around my dining room table laughing and planning the next couple months of music, sorting through old songs and discarding them based on cheesiness, not being able to sing them, or not being relevant to Sunday morning. "so why is 'God bless America in here anyway? Sure it says God but it's not really about Him...""

It's cold but the dishes are done and I can blow out the candles, dive under the pile of blankets and hope it doesn't freeze too badly in here, read the gorgeous words of Eliot, and ponder...

Although I do not hope to turn again
Although I do not hope
Although I do not hope to turn

Wavering between the profit and the loss
In this brief transit where the dreams cross
The dreamcrossed twilight between birth and dying
(Bless me father) though I do not wish to wish these things
From the wide window towards the granite shore
The white sails still fly seaward, seaward flying
Unbroken wings

And the lost heart stiffens and rejoices
In the lost lilac and the lost sea voices
And the weak spirit quickens to rebel
For the bent golden-rod and the lost sea smell
Quickens to recover
The cry of quail and the whirling plover
And the blind eye creates
The empty forms between the ivory gates
And smell renews the salt savour of the sandy earth This is the time of tension between dying and birth The place of solitude where three dreams cross Between blue rocks But when the voices shaken from the yew-tree drift away Let the other yew be shaken and reply.

Blessed sister, holy mother, spirit of the fountain, spirit of the garden,
Suffer us not to mock ourselves with falsehood
Teach us to care and not to care
Teach us to sit still
Even among these rocks,
Our peace in His will
And even among these rocks
Sister, mother
And spirit of the river, spirit of the sea,
Suffer me not to be separated

And let my cry come unto Thee.