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Christos anesti!
Good: it is Easter, and I'm so glad. I think Holy Week is my very favourite liturgical holiday. I mean, Christmas is good, and important, but Easter just feels so immediate, and without Easter Christmas wouldn't mean anything. Plus I love everything about it, from Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesdays to the forty-seven days of Lent that just about KILL YOU but bring you so much closer to God because you remember WHY you're dying. And then Palm Sunday, with the procession of palms, and Maundy Thursday when we get together and wash each other's feet and eat a passover kind of meal--bread and lamb and wine--and then go quietly, shrouding the church in black veils and stripping the altar because Jesus has been taken away.
Then on Good Friday we fast and mourn in the empty church, and on Holy Saturday we prepare, we are so full of the anticipation of relief, we fill the church with lillies and white roses and daffodils, and get all the food ready for the Easter feasting, and we know it's only a little while until the sorrow time is over and Jesus comes back to us--
And then we wake up on Easter Sunday and everything is joyful again. In my house, we still hide eggs, and we write clues for each other and hide our Easter baskets, so we have to go hunting all over for them. Then we go to service and the church is stuffed, and I was eucharistic minister to-day, so I wore my long black robe and my little alb and served wine to my elders and all the children (which is difficult, because I can't see their little mouths, and half the time I miss. >_> but they help out a bit). Then we rush home so we can pile all the food into the car and drive to my aunt's. That's not the fun part, because nobody really likes my Dad's side of the family that much, but Maria and I spent two hours on the cookies last night, decorating them in our usual obsessive-compulsive fashion, and Mama made a beautiful lamb cake that I stole the head off for Charlie.
And I borrowed a hymnal, because the Easter hymns are my favourites, and I wanted to be able to hum them and know the lyrics; and also because I am writing a Galahad/Percy fic for Easter and wanted reference materials.
And now I'm back at school with my bounty of food (enough to kill someone, I think), and the fasting is over, and I got to wear my beautiful Easter skirt. We took the Quaker out on Holy Saturday and he didn't even embarrass us in front of the Mennonites, and I learned to cook the rosemary solution for my shampoo by myself. Also we started the incubator with fourteen turkey eggs in it!
Now I have an essay to write, but I feel--reasonably hopeful about it? Less stressed out. It feels doable. I'll start to-morrow when I get the rest of the materials for it. It's due Thursday. I'll manage. I'm skipping Anthro to-morrow so I can be well-rested for my other classes that I like better. I'm back with my friends and I like that.
Bad: Mama's work insurance changed, and my meds are no longer covered.
Good: it is Easter, and I'm so glad. I think Holy Week is my very favourite liturgical holiday. I mean, Christmas is good, and important, but Easter just feels so immediate, and without Easter Christmas wouldn't mean anything. Plus I love everything about it, from Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesdays to the forty-seven days of Lent that just about KILL YOU but bring you so much closer to God because you remember WHY you're dying. And then Palm Sunday, with the procession of palms, and Maundy Thursday when we get together and wash each other's feet and eat a passover kind of meal--bread and lamb and wine--and then go quietly, shrouding the church in black veils and stripping the altar because Jesus has been taken away.
Then on Good Friday we fast and mourn in the empty church, and on Holy Saturday we prepare, we are so full of the anticipation of relief, we fill the church with lillies and white roses and daffodils, and get all the food ready for the Easter feasting, and we know it's only a little while until the sorrow time is over and Jesus comes back to us--
And then we wake up on Easter Sunday and everything is joyful again. In my house, we still hide eggs, and we write clues for each other and hide our Easter baskets, so we have to go hunting all over for them. Then we go to service and the church is stuffed, and I was eucharistic minister to-day, so I wore my long black robe and my little alb and served wine to my elders and all the children (which is difficult, because I can't see their little mouths, and half the time I miss. >_> but they help out a bit). Then we rush home so we can pile all the food into the car and drive to my aunt's. That's not the fun part, because nobody really likes my Dad's side of the family that much, but Maria and I spent two hours on the cookies last night, decorating them in our usual obsessive-compulsive fashion, and Mama made a beautiful lamb cake that I stole the head off for Charlie.
And I borrowed a hymnal, because the Easter hymns are my favourites, and I wanted to be able to hum them and know the lyrics; and also because I am writing a Galahad/Percy fic for Easter and wanted reference materials.
And now I'm back at school with my bounty of food (enough to kill someone, I think), and the fasting is over, and I got to wear my beautiful Easter skirt. We took the Quaker out on Holy Saturday and he didn't even embarrass us in front of the Mennonites, and I learned to cook the rosemary solution for my shampoo by myself. Also we started the incubator with fourteen turkey eggs in it!
Now I have an essay to write, but I feel--reasonably hopeful about it? Less stressed out. It feels doable. I'll start to-morrow when I get the rest of the materials for it. It's due Thursday. I'll manage. I'm skipping Anthro to-morrow so I can be well-rested for my other classes that I like better. I'm back with my friends and I like that.
Bad: Mama's work insurance changed, and my meds are no longer covered.
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