Better Than Expected Friday

With a quite varied and exciting Holy Week coming to a skidding crawl due to bronchitis and skin rash, I'm holed up here back home in Boca del Monte for the rest of the week off. Sort of a bummer, but a good opportunity to get a lot of demos recorded/movies watched/books read/friends called.

Today I was recording until about five, then decided I oughta head out to the pharmacy for some meds and to the corner store for a pirated DVD. When I rounded the corner out of my dead-end street, I came upon a giant alfombra, which is basically a huge pattern of flowers, vegetables, and colored sawdust to depict bible scenes or religious iconography. They work on these things all day long, right up until the procession passes by carrying incredibly heavy and ornate floats depicting scenes from the passion, and then the alfombras all destroyed in an instant. The temporaryness of all of our works.

There were people gathered in mobs to see the procession go by. Incense was burning. Vendors were selling street food. The brass band was playing dirges. People were dressed in robes, etc. Smells, sights, sounds, even motion. Most people walked right along with the procession, making the whole ritual a bodily, as well as spiritual, experience. I was blessed to experience such a holistic replaying of the drama of the cross on this Good Friday. I was anticipating a quiet night and another conspicuously unLenten-feeling Lenten night. Admittedly, this Lent doesn't seem to have the communal feeling or focused discipline of Lents past, but it will no doubt be a memorable one.