Although we have been having spring break this week in our homeschool, we have not been able to get a break from somethings. Music lessons, for example, have continued because the piano and drum teachers had their breaks a few weeks ago. I’ve come to determine that having a late Easter isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. The weather is still cold and wet and school districts don’t wait for Easter anyway to schedule their breaks. So for the Christian Homeschooler waiting to have their break coincide with Holy Week and Easter or Easter and the first week of Easter, it’s a long and cranky road between the Christmas Holiday and the Triduum! But I digress…
So today was piano day and as is my custom, I dropped the kids off and then went to my favorite spot to get a diet Coke and a paper to read. Coming back I was stopped at a light, waiting patiently for the light to change so that I could make my right-hand turn. Oncoming traffic was fast and steady and I noted those orange construction barrels in the right hand lane I would be turning into. I just never felt that I had a safe opportunity to make the turn, avoid the barrels and get up to speed before the oncoming cars overtook me! So I waited.
But apparently the guy in the truck behind me saw things differently. He honked his horn. Then as soon as the light changed he made a wide right turn so that he was to the left of me. When I looked up he was glaring at me, but not in a lingering way because he also wanted to make sure that he could cut right in front of me causing me to hit the break. But since that didn’t seem enough punishment for the injustice of making him wait behind me at the light, he raised his right arm in triumph and then elevated his middle finger triumphantly as if he had just conquered an evil foe.
Now, I could still see his face in the mirror. He was clearly victorious and proud that he had finally “shown me.” I guess clearly- middle-aged women in family vans are to be shown, and as contemptuously as possible. Whatever my crime, in his mind I deserved this public display of ridicule.
But what this guy didn’t know was that I had just been reading the morning prayers in the Divine Office and had gone over the Office of Readings. This was still in my mind.
It is he who endured every kind of suffering in all those who foreshadowed him. In Abel he was slain, in Isaac bound, in Jacob exiled, in Joseph sold, in Moses exposed to die. He was sacrificed in the Passover lamb, persecuted in David, dishonored in the prophets.
It is he who was made man of the Virgin, he who was hung on the tree; it is he who was buried in the earth, raised from the dead, and taken up to the heights of heaven. He is the mute lamb, the slain lamb, the lamb born of Mary, the fair ewe. He was seized from the flock, dragged off to be slaughtered, sacrificed in the evening, and buried at night. On the tree no bone of his was broken; in the earth his body knew no decay. He is the One who rose from the dead, and who raised man from the depths of the tomb.
And so I’ve done something that I’ve never done before in a traffic mishap. I looked right back at him and made the sign of the cross.
Suddenly he took the first turn right onto the expressway. I wonder if he intended to go that way? I wonder if he knew there were quite a few miles before the next exit?
So that was my something bad.
Something Good is that I was just informed that I made a list of Online Schooling’s list of the best Catholic blogs.
I am writing to inform you that your blog has been featured on Online Schooling’s list of the best Catholic blogs found here: http://www.onlineschooling.net/best-catholic-blogs. We hand-picked a list of our favorites and outlined the unique reasons why we love them.
It seems I’m in some nice company over there too. I also checked out some of their online resources and I’ll be linking to them here over the next few days. Some of their history and literature ones look very good, particularly of the civil war era which is what we are studying now!
It’s nice to be recognized. Even nicer to hear Mr. Pete say, “I’m very proud of your blog and show it off to some of my customers.” He’s a good husband.
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