RSF and Lenten Penance
It’s no use, I can’t do it. As spiritual exercise, in recent years I developed my RSF&PTL habit of “right shoe first and praise the Lord,” putting on the right shoe first, preceded by the right sock if there’s a sock. Then the left. The rule that one ties the left shoe first doesn’t apply to me, because I seldom to never wear shoes with laces. Slip on or Velcro straps. Tie shoes sometimes for weddings, once in a while wear my comfortable brown SAS shoes with laces, but seldom, because I despise tying shoe laces.
Which of course is fodder for psychiatric probing.
RSF&PTL is purely a spiritual exercise that compels me to start my day, or interrupt my day if I’m re-donning shoes, with prayer. We list several kinds of prayer, this is praise prayer, and also an opportunity for thanksgiving prayer. It was deliberate, forced and obnoxious to institute, because my lifelong unconscious habit was to put on the left shoe first, so RSF was part of starting a personal prayer routine that otherwise was deficient. RSF is not the prayer, of course, but stirs the prayer, ignites the prayer. With few lapses, RSF&PTL has become conscious and automatic, and is offered, if not outright recommended, for anyone using Lent to begin a prayer habit. The Jewish origin is well testified online, here’s a simple one:
But what I cannot keep is the maxim to don trousers right leg first. I’ve tried. It doesn’t work for me, won’t work for me, whether I’m standing or sitting. If standing, putting on pants right leg first oddly stirs a balance issue, and at this age I’m not eager to fall. If sitting, some defiance arises. Either way, the disobedience of going left leg first reminds me that I am a sinner, apropos for Lent.
Also for Lent, contemplating the kuriositas site’s visit to skellig michael and placing myself there. For escape, for beauty, for barren, stark, ascetic chill, and as penance:
TW+