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| Easter Candy, April 2021 Mango wood bowl made in Costa Rica |
I gave up sweets for Lent.
Not the most spiritual practice I have ever taken on - but I felt this one in my body. I felt the absence of a bite of something sweet after a meal. I resisted candy, chocolate, cookies, ice cream and baked goods with the hope Lent would feel more real, that my thoughts would turn more towards Jesus - and that I would live the Lenten days with intention.
On the first evening, I went in my 17 year old son's room to say goodnight and we talked for about 30 minutes. Not about anything pressing, just about life, school, baseball and friends. The dog made a nest in the blankets at the foot of the bed. And in the half hour while we were talking, I felt the sweetness of that moment. I savored being in the company of my son, knowing that these evening conversations are becoming more rare. Two years from now, he'll be away at college in a dorm room.
I felt that God offered me a gift of sweetness. A true and pure sweetness - not like the kind I try to fill myself with. All of the sweets I usually reach for seemed a substitute for the sweetness of life itself.
Life isn't all sweet. And there's nothing sweet about where Lent leads us - but each day, I found something sweet in the living of life. It was God's generous gift over the Lenten days.
As we reached Holy Week, the practice had done it's work in me. I found the desire to give sweetness to others as a way of offering it back to God. Each day there was the opportunity to put sweetness into the world, into the lives of others.
In these days of Eastertide, I give thanks for the practice that brought me into this season with a full heart.
