Waiting and Praying

This was a busy day at work. A meeting at nine. Another that spanned much of the afternoon. And, in between an appearance at a kind of settlement conference in which the judge runs from one party to the other encouraging agreement. After spending considerable time with me, the judge left me in my little windowless room for an extended period to cajole my legal counterpart.

I am impatient by nature. Given enough space, I pace. But this room was too tiny for that. I perused my file. I perused my confidential settlement statement and was pleased with its coherence. And then I had nothing to do but wait.

Then, I remembered. I picked up a few inexpensive handmade rosaries on Sunday, the availability of which coincided with the second visitation of the Pilgrimage Statue of Our Lady of Fatima to our parish. Our Lady, making her appearances to three children in Portugal in 1917, urged the daily saying of the rosary for the reparation of sin. I know. I know. Sin, schmin. Who believes in sin anymore? Well, speaking for myself, I do so the story of Fatima somehow resonated with me after the first visit of the statue and I began, haltingly then and now, to recite it, usually at night before I go to bed.

I happened to have one of the two that I bought for ready access in various locations in my pocket and, as I sat in that little room, I thought, "Well, I'll do a decade or two". Distraction is always my companion under the best of circumstances and I am amazed how I can be saying the Hail Mary and thinking about twelve other things. This, of course, is what I am to learn after enough repetitions, to focus only on the act of prayer and to think only of God in the stories of His great love of us.

My distraction on this occasion was the imminent return of the judge. But I managed a whole rosary, and even at some moments during it, the silence of the room buzzed and allowed me a brief true solitude that was unfettered and seemed to open the door to something safe, and exquisite. And eternal.

Back in the constraints of time, though, I think I settled the case!

The Unbearable Consequences of Chocolate

I made no resolutions for the new year. I iterated vague hopes to myself. The usual, eat less, exercise more. But I knew that if hope springs eternal, my bad habits are forever.

So I guess it was no surprise to me, let alone anyone else, that this last Friday at 10 or so p.m. I took a bite into a hunk of Ritter Chocolate, with almonds. Yum--until releasing my carnivore's grasp of the delicacy--I realized that there was a gaping hole in one of my front-ish teeth. Well, a fake tooth, a crown. Going, going, where the heck is it!?

I thought I swallowed it. Yuck! But no, it was, rather, impaled on the Ritter bar, a perfect perpendicular.

Friday night of a holiday weekend. Goodie. I left a "not medically urgent, but cosmetically urgent message" for my dentist. The remnant of tooth on which the crown was lodged I discovered later, looking more like a petrified piece of wood than anything human related. I pause here for a reflection on the ephemeral nature of our life and the crumbling reality of our middle aged bodies.

For some Friday night is date night. For me, it was finding temporary tooth cement night at the CVS. The directions said that sometimes, depending on the break, the cement doesn't work. In my life, sometimes means, "often". Ok, I am not complaining. I am very lucky in my life. Blessed. But I was not pleased. Which was probably good because then maybe I would not smile for the rest of the weekend revealing my Ma Kettle mouth.

Len Speaks, Mr. Anonymous of the Barbara Judith Apartments and I were going to visit a friend living in the wilds of Monrovia. So off I went with a partial cotton ball lodged in the cavernous space--a not so elegant solution when one is eating homemade pizza and cannoli and drinking red wine.

I rose above my sense of impaired beauty (at this stage of the game, turns out to be easy) and removed the cotton and enjoyed the evening's movie, "The Godfather" prime on a 63 inch plasma HD 3D TV, and since it was dark, my appearance was happily irrelevant.

And today my dentist's office had a cancellation, and I spent a lovely two plus hours being filed, ground, polished and fitted with a temporary all while gazing at the Hollywood Sign visible from the office windows. What a life!

In my refrigerator are the remains of an, as yet uneaten, chocolate bar.

If you were betting, would you think I have sworn off another late night munch? I guess it really is that the consequences of chocolate remain bearable. . .at least for now.