— 1 —
Finished.
And having done so, I’m going to give you a heads-up that Lent 2017 is apparently going to be a surprising 1,367 days long.
Because that’s how long it felt in the writing of the devotional.
(Background: I have now written the Advent 2016 and Lent 2017 Daybreaks for Liguori. Look for them to be advertised in the fall, I suppose.)
I wrote the Advent 2016 edition last fall, getting in several months ahead of schedule, but was a couple of weeks late with this. That was intentional – not the lateness, but the timing of the work. I wanted to write a seasonal devotional during the actual season. That’s an unusual experience for a writer. We are usually working completely out of synch – writing Christmas pieces during Holy Week and Ash Wednesday items during Advent.
The other night Fathom Events, which produces those one-off film presentations like productions of the Metropolitan Opera and rereleases of classic movies (they’re showing On The Waterfront in a couple of weeks – we’ll be there) presented Bill, the Shakespeare-ish movie from the fantastic Horrible Histories troupe. It was 
…and we were the only people there. Not surprising. I don’t think there’s a hardcore group of Horrible Histories fans here in the US, much less Alabama. But anyway – the movie was really enjoyable. More polished and a little less crazy than Horrible Histories episodes, with, of course, no relation at all to actual history. Doing a bit of research afterwards, though, I found that they had actually rather cleverly inserted historical references in a sort-of correct way throughout the film. It was great fun to see the super-talented HH crew each play about five different roles. It was quickly paced, and was actually a bit moving at the end as It All Came Together for Bill. Check out when it comes out on video!
This week has also been occupied with driving. Yes, we have a new driver in our house – turned fifteen last week, permit attained on Tuesday, and big empty parking lot of big empty mall circled about 257 times over the past couple of days. This weekend, we’ll attempt an actual road. I think it will be fine. He has a determination to do it, to do it right and correct his mistakes. It’s not my favorite thing parental activity, but here it is…one more to go after this…
The process of getting the permit was not horribly painful – less than two hours in and out, and it would probably have been less if the state’s servers weren’t going down all afternoon. Another mom waiting with her son remarked that they should get the people who operate the gaming systems to run these things – they would never go down. And she’s probably right.
— 4 —
Speaking of lovely bureaucracy, this happened last night. Our downtown post office is open until 8 pm during the week, so I was down there mailing a box of books. There was one person working, and the line was growing – this was about 7:30. I thought…. I sure hope they have more than one person working the counter over the weekend and Monday. But that wasn’t the issue.
There was a woman there when I arrived, parked at the end of the line preparing packages for shipping, waving new customers past her. It was, as it happens, Michael’s first piano teacher. By the time I got served, it was after 8, they had the door to the customer service area halfway closed and an employee standing there making sure new customers didn’t enter. As I was finished up, Ms. P said to an employee, “Oh, I forgot one more set for one more package. Can I just go out to my car and get it?” Employee shook her head. “No. Once you leave, you can’t come back in.” I said, “May I go out and get it for her?” Nope. We looked at each other. She slipped me her keys and told me which car it was. I rushed out, and as it happened, couldn’t find her package where she told me it was. I stepped back in the door – one step, handed her keys back, told her I couldn’t find it, she said she must have left it at home, and I was trying to telling her about Michael winning first place in his age group at the local sonata competition, and immediately starting getting my marching orders barked at me from both employees. “You’re breaking the rules, ma’am.”
— 5 —
I don’t have any of the saints books in stock here, but you should be able to find them at your local Catholic bookstore (which should always be your first stop for Catholic books), and if they don’t have it, ask them to order it – and of course, any online retailer should have them.
For months, I’ve been battling for the top spots in the highly contested category of “Children’s Religious Biography” at Amazon – for a long time, Ben Carson was my nemesis, but then Penguin published a Joan of Arc volume in their excellent “Who is?” series – and, well, I don’t mind St. Joan besting me. But when, for a few days, John Calvin jumped ahead – well, I’m not having that.
(Currently holding at #1 & #2)
Over the next week I hope to finish reading the family exhortation and reread Familiaris Consortio and write something about it. For now, I’ll just say that if you read R.R. Reno in First Things – and the most of what is in the articles linked here at Catholic World Report – that’s where I’m at. I have a slightly different take with a different emphasis, but yes. Once I machete through the thick jungle of ahistorical false dichotomies and straw men, I’ll have something.
I have a couple of articles to write over the next few weeks, but other than that and homeschooling, I’m focusing my brain on…you guessed it…a trip!
It’s back to Italy in a few weeks.
I usually don’t talk about a forthcoming trip until we have already left, but this time, I’ve decided to share my planning and musing beforehand in a more public way. I’ll begin by talking about why we’re going where we (think) we are going.
For now – because the school day must begin – I’ll say that it will be into Bologna and then out of Pisa three weeks later. 2/3 of the trip is sort-of planned, but there’s one chunk of the trip I can’t pin down – Tuscany. (Week 1+ – Emilia-Romagna. Most of Week 2 – Rome. Week 3- Tuscany) There is just so much to see and do, we’ve never been to any of it, so it’s hard to decide. I threw out the possibility of leaving Rome, renting the car and just taking it day by day without making any reservations or plans. It would be a week between that point and coming back home from Pisa. One kid was all for it, the other was doubtful. We’ll see. My argument against taking the day-by-day approach is financial more than anything else. I would probably end up spending more on accommodations that way..so we’ll see. It’s tempting.
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Charlotte was Both 