Easter Triduum 2019

Blessed Easter! I hope my readers had a good Triduum. I started mine by getting a much-needed haircut before the Holy Thursday Mass at St. Patrick's. Friday I took the day off of work, and Travalon had the morning off, so we went for a hike at Jackson's Landing before I sang at the Good Friday service at my own church. It was a beautiful day, so I took walks at Tenney Park and on Governor's Island before Travalon and I went to Common Ground to see Common Chord. (Say that five times fast!) That is the Daughter of Denni's band, and they are always great.

Holy Saturday Travalon and I started the gorgeous day by spreading hay on our community garden plot, then we met Rich and OK Cap for coffee, and then we hung out on the Union Terrace, watching a loon diving in the lake. We went to Olbrich Gardens, where a few things are blooming, and then we had dinner at Bellitalia before Travalon watched the Bucks playoff game and I went to the Easter Vigil at St. Patrick's. (The one at my own church is in Spanish.) I might have gone to the Spanish Mass, but I had to go see my OTHER choir director welcomed into the Catholic church. Such a momentous occasion! I sat with my own sponsor from twenty-three years ago and her family during the Mass, and afterwards I went to the little reception for my OTHER choir director, a baritone from the Lutheran choir, and a former Moslem who spends holidays at Rich's house. Of course, in the middle of the Vigil Mass I suddenly remembered that I have a Notre Dame de Paris rosary (of course I do - why wouldn't I?) - and why hadn't I been praying with that all week? And then I was thinking about their choir, and if their choir director is anything like ours, he couldn't let all those weeks of practice for the Triduum go to waste. So did they pull rank on another church and sing there? "Sorry, Sacre Coeur, OUR choir is singing at this liturgy!" I did find out the next morning, amid the horrifying stories about the slaughter of Christians in Sri Lanka, that in fact the Notre Dame choir had sung at Saint Sulpice, so I wasn't off-base about that.

Yesterday I felt hung over during morning Mass, although I had only had three sips of champagne at that reception. It was probably dehydration - I didn't have to pee once during the whole three-hour Vigil Mass! So then I drank so much water that I had to pee in the middle of the one-hour Easter morning Mass. Pathetic... Travalon and I drove to Oconomowoc to see his mother, and it was a beautiful day so we took her out to sit in the sunshine. Two little kids came up to her and gave her a tiny pink stuffed bunny for Easter. So sweet! Two of the three new Catholics were at Rich's Easter dinner, along with a lot of members of the Usual Gang. My old boss Handy Woman was texting me as we were discussing something called the Guidonean Hand, a Medieval pre-notation system for showing choirs what notes to sing, so it was like she was part of the conversation. The person who makes wonderful desserts made an amazing pistachio cake, and of course Rich made his rosemary lamb, and there were a lot of delicious vegetables. The only bad thing was that on the way to Oconomowoc we saw a scary-looking car accident, and then on the way home from Rich's we saw another one. They must have looked worse than they were, because there was nothing in the news about them.

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