LET GO OF THE CLUTCH

HERS:

I love the inside of St. Jane Frances de Chantel Church in Bethesda, MD where we attended the 5:00 mass on Saturday. It is light and airy, with a soaring ceiling, gleaming floors, cheery stained glass windows, and lots of other windows. This is another church that had windows behind the altar that let the outdoors in (see last week’s blog).

Lou provided an accurate description of mass this week at St. Jane's… it was vanilla. And due to the vanilla nature of this mass, I have decided not to spend time on the church part of “Body and Soul”. Sometimes mass provides inspiration for living and sometimes God’s inspiration is found elsewhere. Let me tell you something… inspiration hit us like a bolt of lightning at dinner after mass.

We went to a little Italian restaurant in Bethesda called Trattoria Sorrento. C’mon, who wouldn’t find some sort of inspiration at an Italian restaurant? There is something religious about Italian food. Lol. The restaurant felt Italian with its stucco walls and decoration. There was a loud young man sitting at the table next to ours who appeared to be an expert on everything. We couldn’t help but hear what he was saying and this had us laughing. We were laughing and chatting over a glass of red wine and grilled calamari tubes in a delicious sauce… sidenote: calamari is so much better when it is breaded and fried. These tubular cephalopods reminded me of something my grandmother served every Christmas Eve as one of the seven fishes… as a little girl, I quickly passed the calamari to the person sitting next to me. The memory of my grandmother was a good one… the calamari tubes, not so much! Last night, after one bite and a major texture thing, I was done with the calamari.

So back to my story… we were chatting and laughing and having a good evening. I’m not sure how we got on the topic, but Lou was sharing a story about his days as a fire fighter in Wethersfield, CT. When he was learning to drive the firetruck he said he would enlist one of the senior guys to “show him the ropes”. On one occasion he was balancing between the clutch and the gas pedal to get the truck moving, but nothing was happening. The senior person (he still remembers his name) asked him what he was doing. Lou said that he was trying to slowly ease off the clutch while slowly push on the gas. The senior firefighter asked why he was doing that and then said to Lou, “Let go of the clutch”.

OMG! Literally and figuratively.  This was one of those “Aha”, “Boom!”, “Wow!” moments for us. There were blaring trumpets. I looked at Lou and said, “That’s it! Let go of the clutch!” In this crowed restaurant, we stared at each other for a long time. I had tears in my eyes… I won’t speak for Lou, but he may or may not have his card taken away.

With these five very simple words, it was like we had been given keys to the universe, and in that moment, we both knew it!

Ok, let me explain. The balance between the clutch and the gas is fear. It is being stuck, whether emotionally, spiritually, physically, or mentally. The words, Let go of the clutch, represent the ability to get off the fence and make a decision. They represent letting go of vanilla and adding other flavors, or even sprinkles! They would be similar to Nike’s, “Just do it”. “Let go of the clutch” is living life to its fullest, not being afraid, loving fully, letting go of regrets, and (fill in the blank).

It was in that moment, I knew, in those five words we had found our homily.

Have a great week and remember to let go of the clutch.


HIS:

Is your life larger or smaller?!  God often wants more for us than what we want for ourselves.  Can we rise to this challenge?  I read recently a quote that said, “live life like you mean it.  Wake up every morning with a purpose.”  With all the demands that life places on us, this is often difficult to do.  Not impossible, but difficult.  This takes a commitment and effort, which ties into, “is your life larger or small?”  More on that in a bit.

This week brought the Roamin’ duo to St Jane Frances de Chantal in Bethesda for the 5:00 pm mass.  Not a lot of history of the parish is available except that the parish was founded as a mission in 1950 and the original location was part of the Visitation convent on Old Georgetown Road, who’s location is now part of the National Institutes of Health campus.  Absent a narrative on the parish, a little background on St. Jane Frances de Chantal.  She was born in Dijon (they make great mustard) France to a wealthy family and was widowed at a young age.  With four young children, she made the decision to devote her life to her children and live a life of chastity.  Jane Frances Fremiot was a Baroness and became the mistress of her house after her mother’s death and her older sister’s marriage.  Along with St. Francis de Sales, she went on to found the Visitation order of nuns (apparently the connection to the Visitation convent locally.)  The order dedicates their life’s work to the virtues of Mary and to help the sick and poor.  I found several quotes attributed to her writings to be quite uplifting, among them these two especially apt: “To pay no attention to an injury heals more evil in an hour than revengeful thoughts could ever bring to pass.” And, “Though we should fall fifty times a day, let us rise again quite simply, without wasting thought in self-reflections on what we may have done or left undone.  Such useless discouragements are often greater faults than the ones that so disturb us.”  Useful words as we make our way through this earthly life.

This week’s readings reveal for the first time, thouest are thrownest under thy bus…. I think most people remember the story of Adam and Eve from the first book of the bible, Genesis.  Adam and Eve are banished from the Garden of Eden for partaking of the forbidden fruit.  When Adam is asked by God, (picking up in the middle of the story), “Who told you that you were naked?  You have eaten, then, from the tree of which I had forbidden you to eat.”  Adam didn’t waste a minute in pointing his finger at Eve.  “SHE made me do it!!”  In turn, when Eve was questioned, she pointed the finger at the serpent.  She was tricked!  That bus created some tire tracks!  Its best that Adam and Eve discovered they were naked because now Eve can put on a frock to cover up them tire tracks!  I think the serpent is just roadkill now, but I digress.  The gospel reading contained a passage that I thought originated with our democracy but apparently goes back much further and is seen in the Gospel according to Mark.  A house divided against itself cannot stand.  Truer words have rarely been spoken and further proof to the old adage (and one of my favorites), those who fail to heed the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them.  Many of the lessons learned in the readings of the bible can be applied to what’s going on in our country today, if our elected officials would just listen.  Which dovetails into how I began this week’s piece.  Is our life larger or smaller?  The homilist attached to the end of this missive several questions, but I think the largest was probably the reason we are all here.  Is our life larger or smaller than helping our fellow man?  God wants more for us than we often want for ourselves.  Good thoughts to ruminate on.

Dinner this week was at Trattoria Sorrento in Bethesda.  The food was delicious but the company was even better.  Mary and I dined on Fettucine Carbonara, Veal Milanese and a starter of grilled calamari.  The dining choices were tough as they had quite an extensive menu with many delicious choices.  We were greeted and served by a charming young lady who was very pleasant and added to the welcoming atmosphere of the establishment.  Her evening became a bit more challenging upon the arrival of a large and very demanding party seated next to us.  We also received a visit from the (perceived) owner of the establishment which was nice in a way that the repeated visits to our table of the manager at del Friscos from a few weeks ago was not.  For a small business, I feel it is imperative to find out how your patrons are doing.  To me, this can make or break an experience.  I recommend this establish to anyone who likes Italian food and will definitely visit again to sample additional items from the menu.   See you next week.

And as always, our Soulfie. Was this us preparing for our "Wow" moment?!