Life and Lent

"Dad, what are you doing?
"I'm trimming this branch so the whole bush will look like a dove in several years."

I had just gotten home.
Fourth-grade in a new school was grueling.

"Dad, what happened to our roses?"
"Well..." he said slowly.

"They were so pretty... white ones, yellow ones, red ones, my favorite was the yellow with red edges," I prattled on.
"You know how Mom went to the doctor the other day."
I nodded, suddenly noticing how slow he spoke.

"They said she was allergic to pollen. Roses have pollen."
He bent his head and went back to trimming.

I looked around our front yard. I just realized that Dad had uprooted every flowering plant in the last few days: his eight rose bushes, the jasmine vine that climbed all over our front fence, and the hibiscus flowers that bordered our left path. He had put down other plants in its place, like this evergreen shrub.

Every year, when Lent begins and all the flowers are removed from the churches to remind us that we are in the season of penance, I remember my dad's silent gesture.

I don't recall once my dad telling my mom he loved her.
They were an old-school Vietnamese couple.

Yet, before I joined the convent, I learned that the purpose of sacrifice is to love.
And make room for other kinds of life.
This is what Lent is about.

To sacrifice so that love can be seen and smelt.
So that other kinds of life, the life of your family and your friends, can have room.

Photo credit: dipity.com