Today is the final day before the great season of Lent begins. The Anglicans call this Shrove Tuesday, from an archaic term for reconciliation. Every year, my work ramps up during the six weeks before Easter. I feel it coming. The stressing out and the to-do list-making that softly clucks at me between the plaintive strains of Kyrie Eleison, and finds me within the dark, contemplative silences. So many distractions fill my head even as the silences lengthen, and the Sunday music grows more sober, more austere. I am quite sure this is not the state of heart and mind to which this composer of sacred music is called. Is still being called.

Why it is that every year I look around and see everyone “doing Lent” except me? Every year, I vow that this Lent will be different. Every year it is not.

Now, perched on the verge of another Lent, I gaze out the window of my office, and tell myself I will be ready this time. I consider the pale, dead, sky of gray. I watch the rain falling upon the already-drenched earth, and pray for the many who are still digging out of the mud along the Russian River. I think of those who have died in these past days, and those who mourn. The reign of God is unfolding all around me, in the living and dying, in the drenching and drying of the soil, and in the digging out. It sounds forth in the birdlike voices of children who already practice their cheerful songs of Eastertide.

I have so much for which to atone, but even more for which to be grateful. Maybe I will just start there.

It’s a two-part plan: Show up. See what happens.