Tenebrae -Of Shadows in Altgeld Gardens: Good Intentions, Sin Guilt and Poor Old Judas.

Today is Spy Wednesday; the day Judas Iscariot took coin from Caiaphas and the gents of Sanhedrin in order to betray Jesus.

Money exchanged hands.

It was also the day that, while Judas was ensuring that no kid would be baptized with his cognomen, a woman from Bethany anointed Jesus with oil.

An expensive gift was given.

Spy Wednesday is also known as the Tenebrae, the Time of Shadows, when the liturgical year goes dark, until Easter. It signals the beginning of the Passion - Jesus conducts the first Mass on Thursday, followed by the agony in the Garden, the disciples beat it, Peter denies knowing Jesus, the Temple guards arrest Jesus, take Him to Caiaphas and Caiaphas hands Jesus over to the civil authorities. On Friday, Jesus is condemned by the secular government, tortured and crucified.

Money and gifts are signs of intentions.  One is awful and one is sweet.

Most of my greatest sins were rooted in what I thought were good intentions. I lacked the Wisdom to know the difference between evil and genuine sweetness.

Some of my best moments as a human being were rooted genuine sweetness.  In 1998, just after my wife passed away, I was heading home to Griffith, Indiana, where a local woman watched my three kids.  I was and remain a train wreck of complicated grief and self-pity.  I picked up a mother and her young daughter who were standing in the south-east bound emergency lanes of the Bishop Ford Expressway at 115th Street, near the OTB. She had been standing there with the little girl for about a half hour and needed to get home to Altgeld Gardens.  I asked her why she was on the Ford, when the Gardens were to the east and told to mind my own damn business. The little girl about six or seven cried up a storm.   It was snowing like a son of a gun.  The woman had blown her week's money at the Illinois Gaming Board Approved entertainment outlet.

I gave the woman a twenty spot and drove the two of them into the Gardens.  I felt pretty good.

The next night I went to Trump Casino, played Caribbean Stud and lost two weeks pay.  Not my first or last rodeo that one. I am one degenerate gambler - two recoveries and waiting for next fall from grace.

Judas got nothing on me, but despair.

We all slip and fall. Peter denies Jesus three times before the rooster does the two count; James and beloved John, as well as the balance of the Disciples went into the shadows, as well.  Pilate washed his hands.  The good people, after considerable polling showed that Barabbas was a sweetheart, shouted for Jesus' Crucifixion.  The Men of the Cohort gambled "responsibly" for Jesus' clothes. Yet, we all can ask for forgiveness.

Money is not a gift.

That's my lesson out of the shadow. Time for this sinner to hit the Confessional box.  Reconciliation is renewal - you can't have a Happy Easter, or a solid Passover, without it.  

So, I Said 'Drop Dead Sister, I'm Dating a Swell Dish!' . . .and the Silly Skirt Did -On the Spot!

It's Spy Wednesday, See?

So, I'm out side waiting for the lovely Terry to finish her Alto chores with the Cantate Domino Choir's Tenebrae services at St. John Cantius Catholic Church. This young skirt with doe eyes approaches me on the steps of the Church. A real Peach Cobbler. I ain't looking,see, but I ain't blind.

'Please, Mister, I need help.'

I thumbed the brim of my Optimo grey Stetson up above my thick greying eye brows to take in a full eye-gulp of this Pastry Doll with a red patterned cotton dress clinging to the quality flesh, muscles and bones beneath the rounded cup of her chin holding the reddest lips this side of a transvestite review at the Admiral Theatre.

'Don't we all?'

' Please all I need is a ride to my cousin's apartment on Ogden, my flip flops broke.'

'Where you from, Apple Tart, this is Chicago - The Big Wind - Weather from Alaska, Hawaii.'

'I'm new in town and Tom Skilling said that it would be unseasonably mild.'

'Skilling sold you, Peach Cobbler, like he did to the grand jury when his little brother looted Enron. I'm raising three kids already.'

' Please, Mister!'

I thought hell, it's Holy Week and Tenebrae is longer than a Studs Terkel Tribute on Channel 11.'

The weeping elf gave me the address and we Chevy Malibu's it down Ogden to Race Street.

'Out you go.'

'Please, come up with me? The vestibule has poor lighting.

Agatha Christie she ain't, but she'll do, as the Vestibule had worse lighting than my tired fifty-six year old eyes. The rusty rose paint covering the dry wall that stood in for lathing and plaster was as attractive as a fat bar-fly ex- Mount Carmel Cheerleader topped off with a few litres of warm Carlo Rossi Rose and perfumed by a pack and half of Pall Malls and half a dozen Slim Jims.

'Please, come up - it might not be safe.'

I volunteered for John McCain; nothing scares me anymore and up I went.

We got into the cousin's apartment which was a room and Murphy Bed -down and unmade. The cousin probably celebrated the end of Operation Desert Storm by making up the rack.

'Please hold me I am so alone!' The Gooey Confection with the pan of a fattened up Lara Flynn Boyle leeched onto me.

'Listen, Sister, I don't know your game but the whistle's been blown. Hit the showers.'

'Don't be cruel. You are so much older and nicer than the men who have made me do things . . .make robocalls for Mike Quigley. He's in Congress now'

' Where Quigley belongs - that or a midget basketball team. Sing it Sister, but you are the audience. I'm bouncing.'

'I can Make you happy.'

'I am Happy. See me grinnin'?'

She held up both arms to me. 'Take me or I'll just die! I'll do anything you say.'

'Look, Rhubarb Pie, this particular Hair-pin is stuck deep in another Babe's bonnet. The Real Deal. This schooner don't cruise, see? I'm chained to my Baby's Boardwalk and She's singing in Church and hugging my arm for keeps. Drop Dead.'

I only meant it metaphorically.

The Pretty Pop-Over snapped up off the deck; kicked her quality gams to One Eighty and flattened out in mid air and drooped like a three by five foot -three quarter inch cut of plywood and pancaked on the floor. Dust bunnies danced for what seemed an eternity.

The Fruit Strudel in cotton and busted flip-flops was as stiff as a poker, and more rigid than an Obama Press Conference.

She was deader than Pat Quinn's tax plans. I called the cops. Told them my story. They told me to blow. I Malibu'd back to St. John Cantius. Tenebrae was about a third done. I stood on the steps of the beautiful old Polish Church and listened to blend of angelic voices calling up the sins of this sad planet. Tenebrae - shadows.

That Fruit Pie could flop.


H/t Blather.com great photos!