I grew up Catholic, which meant that the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday was the day when my friends and I all had to decide what we were going to Give Up For Lent. In elementary school, we always gave up stupid things, like gum! and candy! which none of us really ever had anyway (and we certainly never had gum at school). But honestly, it’s hard when you are eight or nine or ten to really give up anything of significance. My father suggested, one year, that instead of giving up something that we wouldn’t be missing we try to do something instead, like pick up our rooms or make our beds before my mother had to ask us for the 200th time. I remember liking this idea, although I don’t remember if I actually followed through.

Despite the fact that I’m not a churchgoing person as an adult, I still like the notion of Lent as a time of mindfulness. After struggling with my dissertation for three years, I tried ‘giving’ it up for Lent; my insomnia went away and I was able to focus on reading and writing and teaching in ways I hadn’t been able to when I was ‘working’ on the dissertation. In the past few years, I have tried to see Lent as a time to focus on the details of my life and my day–to play more with my children, to call or e-mail friends I have lost touch with, to take time to meditate or just breathe.

This year, for the next 40 days, I want to consciously seek the peaceful moments in my day, the times when I am not feeling rushed or pulled in a hundred directions, the times when I am still and calm. I want to focus more on each moment instead of worrying about the future. I want to feel like my days are a series of connected occurrences rather than a blur of errands and tantrums and dishes. I can do that for forty days, I think.

I also have a writing project that I want to finish, which will require starting, as it is all still in my head. And no, I’m not telling what it is; you will have to wait and see, although I will say that it is something that started here. I will also say that you should read this (and if you really have some time to kill, you can read the comments too–all 1,000 plus of them) because any more, for me, writing is about the conversation not the isolated words on the paper.

Today, though, as it is supposed to be 80 degrees here, I am going to take the boys to the zoo, and then we are going out for donuts (although they will be Krispy Kreme, not proper beignets) to celebrate the start of forty peaceful days at our house.