"I Haz Met the Enemy & He Iz Me"

I thank Thee, Lord, that Thou hast made me JUST as other men are, and even given me the grace to recognize it....
I do know it, really I do. I just have trouble remembering that I know it.
Himself is off to a volunteer activity, one that requires real, make-you-bone-weary labor, and he is heading there early, in order to make it impossible for anyone to guilt him into staying late.
He explained who it was who indulges in the attempted lazy-shaming, and quoted the "tired of being left to finish this up all by myself" emails, and since I know the person, I surmise that being unpleasant pretty much guarantees the same outcome every time.
Himself then drew parallels to a subordinate of his in another charitable work he does - that guy refuses to acknowledge that his area of authority is under the umbrella of a larger program,  (Himself is fine with that, hates being in charge of anyone else in the first place,) except when he needs more help, which he constantly does, and then he expects Himself to scare up some minions.
The guy is always wailing that he is too old to be doing so much on his lonesome, he needs assistance, why is his load so great? more volunteers are found by my husband, the guy talks to them as if they are mentally disabled 5 year olds, bosses them, scolds them, yells at them, insults them in front of others; they quit, and he gets to wail again that he's too old to be doing so much, needs help, behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me!
"Which," says Himself, a light bulb going off over his head, "is what he actually wanted all along."
I think in the movie, "Last Days in the Desert," a very clever thing was done in casting the same actor to play both the human incarnation of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity and the Evil One.
This is not some heretical dualism, but a visual representation of Christ the "high priest who is [not] unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has similarly been tested in every way."
Surely in these tests, in these temptations to sin, one is often one's "own worst enemy."
Temptations aren't ugly, obviously evil possibilities that present themselves - they seem good and true and beautiful, THAT'S  WHY  THEY  ARE  TEMPTING.
And our sins are habitual because vices are habits we allow ourselves, even when taking actions putatively intended to produce virtuous, or at least beneficial to us, results.

See? I tried Y [solution] but it ends up that I have to do Z [sin]. It's not my fault, it's X's!!!!!! Why does this always happen to me?

It is amazing how often, and how blatantly we sabotage our own stated goals. And we don't need the Serpent to suggest it - no, the devil can take his ease, we're his Useful Idiots and will do all the work for him.
It's never my fault.
I think of the Islamists who resort to murderous violence because someone insulted them by saying they were prone to murderous violence.
It's the cartoonist's fault!
I think of the self-proclaimed "nice guy" who goes on a vicious rampage because women don't recognize his niceness, and so believes they "deserved to be dumped in boiling water for the crime of not giving me the attention and adoration I so rightfully deserve."
They didn't think he was nice, go figure...
So it's women's fault!

And yes, it's my fault. And Lent is about trying to remember that, and repent of that, and remedy that.

I think of that axiom about the government we have, and think perhaps, yeah, we all commit the sins we deserve.
It is God, against Whom we sin Who doesn't deserve them.

Should I be angry to read Blessed Teresa of Calcutta maligned? not to say, "lied about"?

I have a problem with... I have been having a problem with anger.
And I have come, or at least think I have come to an acceptance of the fact that the source is, not as a priest suggested to me a sorrow to which I did not wish to subject myself again, (which would have allowed me to be play the victim,) but a pride-produced expectation that things would go my way because things SHOULD go my way, because, well, ME.

I had forgotten something, a few years ago a very good and very wise woman  at a CMAA "do" warned me about becoming like another very good but not quite as wise woman.
They had very similar PsOV, held to very similar principles, both theological/spiritual and liturgical/musical; and embraced similar currents of Catholic thought - currents I was watching from the bank, into which I was cautiously dipping the occasional toe.
Don't become like her, don't be angry all the time.
Because she was right, you see, but she was damaging herself and her causes with the anger. (Her anger did come from having been wounded, genuinely, and perhaps a resolution to attack rather than be vulnerable? I don't know. But I digress.)
I think I have actually gained on handle on my situation.
I try to remember opponents are not enemies, everyone has his reasons of which I know not, and stop gettin' all judgey.
This is easiest, actually - strangely - in affairs about which I am most passionate: no matter how stupid or wrong-headed their ideas or actions, I cannot think that any other human being in the Church is stupid and wrong-headed out of malice.
No one, despite Shakespeare's Iago and Shaefer's Salieri, no sane person deliberately sets themselves against Almighty God, no one is knowingly a tool of the evil one.

Is he?

A Useful Idiot, perhaps, but not knowingly and believingly in league with the devil.

On the Great Time Suck That Is Those Interwebs. (hereinafter the GTSITI,) I came across a screed about good priests who have borne the displeasure of TPTB, and dissenting or at least politically savvy chancery hounds, (and yes, thinking, there but for the grace of God go I, I thank Thee that I am not like other orthodox Catholics, angry and....)

Shockingly, I recognized a name, someone with whom I have broken bread many a time.
But that is neither here no there.
Looking into that, I came across another thing and another, and then this, and then that.... as I said, you know the GTSTITI.
Finally, (stumbling across quite a bit of anger from one side and superciliousness from the other along the way,) I ended up at a eulogy for a departed religious sister.
The writer told a story the religious sister had told him about something Dorothy Day told her, (or perhaps the sister had supposedly overheard,) that she, (DD,) had said to and regarding Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, and it seemed... spurious? uncharacteristic? And we all know about "quotes on the internet" and "who never said what."

And another story. The mid-70s rolled around, and organizers asked José to emcee the Eucharistic Conference in Philadelphia. In this particular sessions were some five thousand women. Two speakers were on hand: Dorothy Day and Mother Teresa, both close friends of José.
First, José introduced Mother Teresa -- on that day in a foul mood. She rose to the podium, all fire and brimstone, and excoriated the women in the audience. You nuns -- why aren’t wearing your habits? You mothers -- how is it you’re here and not home with your children? The women withered and blanched. Mother Teresa had left them hurt and angry, and she returned to her seat to the deafening sound of silence. Not a pair of hands offered applause. Mother Teresa seemed taken aback.
With tension now on the air, José introduced Dorothy Day. She sidled up to Mother Teresa and leaned in close and issued something in the nature of a rebuke: “Mother, you know I love you more than anyone. But don’t you ever say anything like that again. You have alienated and hurt all these good women. They need our encouragement!” As far as anyone knows, Mother Teresa never did. 

That didn't sound right.
And if wrong, it does seem malicious.
Well, it seems Mother Teresa gave two talks at this 1976 Congress. The Tablet, not exactly in the vanguard of the hosts of Catholic orthodoxy tells us,

Big names studded the programmes : Archbishop Helder Camara, Cardinal Suenens, Dorothy Day and the rest. The press and the public swarmed, around Mother Teresa of Calcutta. "They idolise her without imitating her," a Canadian Protestant muttered in my ear.

Having read the snipe at Blessed Teresa in the National Catholic Reporter, I couldn't help but think of the spin put on Ratzinger's election by those who opposed him, reports of the sad, shocked, weepy crowd in St Peter's Square. You remember them, how upset and sullen everyone was -

 

Right.
So here is a site with quite a bit about the Eucharistic Congress, (not "conference",) in question.
As I said, two talks from Blessed Teresa, one sound recording here, and the full text of the address she gave on the day when she shared the stage with Dorothy Day.

Go ahead, read it. It's GORGEOUS.

I don't think I am going out a limb at all to say that someone lied, both regarding the content of what she said, and the probable reaction to it.
Lied.
LIED.
I don't know who. (I doubt it was the also-soon-to-be-sainted Day. I'll leave it at that.)
Well, as the Gospel today reminds us, the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than the children of light.

2% Milk At Your Fingertips

I don't "do" my nails, (too lazy, use my hands to much, don't really want to call attention to their usually scarlet ugliness.)

Beyond that I have never, but never understood the amount of time women are willing to devote to them -- I did a show once, (union, Equity, rules-and-regs-professional, you understand,) where one cast member was incorrigibly late for every single rehearsal, and for half hour at most performances.

She was a new mother, and would always breezily tell the stage manager, "You don't know what it's like with a small child," and since indeed he did not and was loathe to project too Legreeish an image, she got a pass.

What no one ever called her on was the fact that she did have the time to have a new and elaborately colorful manicure every day, (the thought of the poor infant whose diapers were being changed by those talons was another matter. And we won't even think about the hygiene of the situation...)

So you see, I'm the sort of person who makes a virtue of sloth -- I act as if painted nails were the height of frivolity and self-absorption.
I've done them from time to time, when a role called for it, (Joanne in Present Laughter, Mart in Company,) for biggish occasions, weddings, (though not my own,) and maybe twice in my life my toenails, when open toed shoes entered my life.

All that said, is this not the best name ever for a nail color? (the namers-of-shades in the cosmetic industry put the much mocked namers-of-shades for J Crew all to shame.)

 

Wet N Wild Megalast Salon Nail Color  

2% Milk

And it's really lovely, in truth. It's the sort of color I'd think about wearing. If I wore color...