Maundy Thursday and Papaya

With mama at Community Health & Rehab this week, Linda and I were able to get out, so Tuesday we drove over to Destin Commons to select a wedding gift for Lauren at Williams Sonoma. After that we went to Fresh Market for our occasional browse and to get lunch at the deli. In the browse I picked up some whole wheat angel hair pasta, some walnuts and some shaved almonds to sprinkle on morning cereal. A strange breakfast cereal that obviously is healthy because it’s packaged in a ruggedly coarse looking box. A roast beef hoagie, ate half Tuesday supper, a quarter Wednesday supper and still a quarter in the refrigerator. Can’t load up a container from the olive stand anymore, loaded with salty brine, strictly forbidden. Linda scolded me for buying a few boiled shrimp, so I sat in the back seat and ate them while she was driving home (hey, it’s better than eating fried shrimp, nicht wahr?). Also picked up my favorite thing there, half a papaya. It’s for early breakfast this morning.

My first papaya was May or June 1966. I was officer in charge of a Navy branch office in Yokosuka, Japan and we were consolidating with the regional office in San Diego. Our commander had left and I was appointed to close the place down. Flew to Honolulu for a conference about the transition. Ocean front Waikiki, view of Diamond Head. For breakfast in the hotel one morning I ordered half a papaya and forever thereafter was smitten.

See this is the kind of inanity folks would get if I posted on Facebook. Orange juice instead of coffee soon after four a.m. while contemplating whether to write a +Time post. Maybe fruit, this morning papaya for sure. See Kristen off to Bay Hi at 7:10 then do my walk. Breakfast on return. Hot cereal with strong flavored grade C maple syrup. Or cold cereal with 1% milk walnuts and almonds, unprocessed wheat bran. About five a.m. LInda comes down, has coffee, reads the PCNH and works the crossword puzzle. 

On the History Channel last evening a show about the crucifixion which I only saw out of the corner of my eye because I find their religion shows disappointingly more sensational than serious. Major attention to the Shroud of Turin, controversial Roman Catholic devotional relic from the fourteenth century. Six post-resurrection appearances documented on a time line, though to do this one must combine all the canonical gospels and yield a fifth gospel that isn’t faithfully any of the Four. Another bit of sensationalism from the History Channel.

Maundy Thursday. Maundy apparently from Latin mandatum because at the Last Supper in John’s gospel Jesus gave his New Commandment mandate: “love others as I have loved you.” In the synoptics at the Last Supper Jesus instituted what we now celebrate as Holy Eucharist. Tonight 6:00 p.m. Holy Eucharist, reservation of the blessed Sacrament, stripping of the Altar.

Time for papaya.

TW+