It's Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent.

I have deeply mixed feelings about organized religion, but some of its aspects are very helpful in daily life. Top of the list is the traditional Christian calendar, and I'm confident that Jews and Muslims and Hindus and Zoroastrians every other faith group that does holidays would agree. At bottom, Lent is forty days set aside to figure out where and how we are failing to do right, and to correct our behaviour and, thereby, our thinking.

There's a thousand ways to use it, from resolving to eat better and clean the house (and then bloody well doing it) to weekly attendance at Stations of the Cross and hefty alms-giving. Some people swear off their guilty pleasures (giving up booze and chocolate, for example), others go back to the gym in anticipation of bathing-suit season, and still others do something more intellectual to achieve self-improvement in anticipation of Spring.

As a PK (preacher's kid), Edmund always marked Lent with giving stuff up, usually booze and sweets. One year, he tried to give up meat and actually made it to Laetare Sunday (the third Sunday in Lent) before caving in to the temptation of double-smoked bacon. He felt personally burdened by the fact that his birthday always fell squarely in the middle of Lent, making timely celebration awkward.

I'm not giving up booze or chocolate or meat, and I'm not planning to become a frequent flyer at Stations of the Cross. I think I'll give up procrastination, especially with respect to boring jobs I loathe, such as washing the kitchen floor and vacuuming the parlour rug, and responsibilities that bug me, such as choir administration. Of course, I give up procrastination every year and so far it hasn't quite taken, but I live in hope.

It's a beautiful day in Stratford with bright sunshine despite predictions of foul weather from Environment Canada. I think I'll have lunch and go for a walk downtown.