Abbot Damien's Last Abbatial Mass, and I got there

Although I am on Klonopin and bearing a black eye, I convinced my mother to ride to the Abbey for Mass. Now, that sentence is packed with meaning, and I cannot procede until I've explained it all.

The Klonopin I've mentioned being on. I'm better with it, but it is still a mighty powerful Benzodiazapin that you don't want to mess around with. When it says sit down, I sit down. So, this morning I knew in my heart I could make the drive there and back, but that being alone no one could say, "you better pull over and let me drive." I asked my mother to do it.

The black eye. Well sometime drainage comes in a usual way, you cough a bit and sniff and snort, but this time it was like a baseball, I coughed, choked, and passed out. Slamming the ridge of my temple bone onto the baseboard. This was in front of other people, so I have witnesses it is the truth.

Now, the most interesting aspect of that opening paragraph is my mother at Catholic Mass with me. All her life my mother has been a member of the Church of Christ. She has never been a literalist or a biblicist, and has allowed all her children the freedom to find God on their own. At the age of 18 I was received into the Episcopal Church and from that time onward, significant religious ceremonies were lonely affairs for me, because everyone had family there, except me.

Two of the most important days of the Church year, The Vigil of Easter, and the Second Sunday of Easter, I was able to have someone from my family with me, at a ceremony with meaning for me. So when she drove with me to Mass because I needed to be at Gethsemani today, it was a double blessing.