Lent is not going well. Not well at all.

Maybe it was the lack of pancakes, or the absence of any real ashes in my life. Or it could be my hard heart. Which do you think? Pancakes, ashes, hard heart... Not too hard to figure out, is it?

I tell you my hatred of the church grows with every holiday that I am left outside. And I do mean to say that I hate it. True hate, not hate relative to, oh, I don't know.... say, broccoli. I hate it. I hate it mainly because I love it. And if any of you can figure that one out then you're one up on me.

Of course I could go into any church I wanted and there is an almost 100 percent chance that I wouldn't be escorted out. Even an Episcopal church. But, could I do it without my heart breaking? That's the question.

I have been very disquieted lately. It's beyond annoyance, more than an irritation. And, I can't even say what it's about. I am just deeply unsettled. Something is wrong.

I am also angry. Really mad. I mean, if you think the young woman who threw her body across Pennsylvania Avenue to protest the administration's AIDS policies was mad... honey, you should see me now. Just add on to that anger and grief twenty years of being a good homo, twenty years of being polite, twenty years of pretending that evil is just another policy position. I've had twenty or more years of being good. I am really not sure how much longer I can do it.

I thought that as I got older I'd see more shades of gray, that I'd be more tolerant of dissent, even a little bit jolly about it. But, it is not turning out like that. I have less and less tolerance for homophobia, racism, and stupidity in general. I just about punched an old man the other day for telling me a racist joke. Me! I don't even kill mosquitoes and I was thinking that I ought to belt that guy. An old man.

See, something is wrong.

I had hoped that if I sat down and started writing that I would come up with a decent blog post but it is now apparent that it's not happening. I did promise a post on honoring your parents a few weeks back so maybe I'll do that later. I have found that if church doesn't want me, at least the blog world does. I need to blog to feel connected. I think I also promised a post about some saint. I believe he was being persecuted by his sister-in-law or something like that. Hummm, wonder why THAT resonates?

Apparently I am going to have a busy evening of interruptions. I am having a big garage sale tomorrow and there is quite a lot more involved than I realized when I lightly made the suggestion. The experience of preparing for the garage sale is a very good incentive for me not to acquire so much stuff in the future.

And, there it is again... time for me to go put out signs. Who knew you had to do that?