Weird Lenten musings

On Friday, after the Liturgy, our parish had a Lenten supper to commemorate the end of Lent, and the beginning of Holy Week the next day with the celebration of Lazarus Saturday. The service and the dinner was actually poorly attended because the tornadoes that rolled through the South that day chose to go very very near our area right before the Liturgy was due to begin. Thus, many people chose to stay home rather than trying to drive through high winds and soaking rain.

For those of us who made it, the very small crowd gave an opportunity to chat with people with whom you normally would not have much time to spend. I was sitting at a table with an Army veteran and two other people. Since we were at table, the talk naturally turned to food. And, since two of us had spent some time overseas, the talk turned to unusual foods. In other words, we were talking about the type of foods that people in the USA would normally neither eat nor order if they were to see on a restaurant menu.

For instance, one person had been stationed in Korea, and while visiting some friends he had made, was offered a nice meal of dog. Now, for all who have served in Korea or Viet Nam or Laos, you know that this is not an unusual dish to offer. Well, so the talk went on. It was a great talk; we were able to get to know each other better than we would have in a large crowd. But, at the end of the half hour of conversation, I did notice something odd.

We had spent the entire half hour talking about MEAT dishes. I began to laugh internally and commented that to our parish priest who chuckled and said not to go there. I think our systems are starting to say that they want MEAT. If you have seen the children’s movie, “Madagascar”, you will understand if I say that one person commented that he was beginning to look at animals and see walking steaks!

So, I did a quick internal tally. As best I can remember, we talked about eating beef, oxtail, sausege, cat, dog, armadillo, horse, burro, chicken, goat, beef tongue, entrails, lung, liver, and probably one or two other animals and/or their parts. One person even talked about seeing a t-shirt that said, “I like animals. They are delicious.” Perhaps it is just as well that there is only one week of fasting to go. Meanwhile, it might be good not to tempt us by offering us your animals to pet.