Pascha!

So much has happened.

Last night, as my acquaintances and I walked into our church with our Pascha baskets stuffed full of yummy edibles, there was a feeling of Festivity! in the air.  We couldn’t see the stars, because it had suddenly become overcast earlier that afternoon.  But pinpricks of anticipation still seemed to be reaching down to us.

The eating side of the former barn was dimly lit by votive candles in dark red glass holders.  We set our baskets down on the main food table, and entered the darkened main part of the church (crossing myself was still a conscious gesture that needed mental preparation).  I couldn’t smell the traces of hay, like I sometimes can when I enter.  I smelled incense and beeswax.  The only light was from the fixtures over the choir’s music stands, and a faint flickering of some candles behind the altar.

The girl who sings, all by herself, the soprano part in our tiny choir, greeted me with an embrace and a face lit up, like a child’s at Christmas.  "This is my favourite service of the whole year," she said.  Strange: I once subbed a piano lesson for this girl and her sister – they used to be students of Gemutlichkeit Woman.  Now she is the one who teaches me how to sing Orthodox services.

I cast a glance at one of the acquaintances who had come with us – a friend of Unnameable Orthodox Guy’s, from one of his jobs – a woman who was about to experience her first Orthodox service.  I had told her tales of some of my first experiences.  I had definitely raised expectations of giddiness and hijinx.  Pascha does odd things to otherwise staid people, I’ve noticed.  She shared a wry smile with me as she took a spot near the back of the church.

The singing began.  The hours of standing, swaying slightly to soothe tired feet.  The hymn for when the light was passed, from candle to candle and person to person, was especially beautiful.  Soon the church was a galaxy of lit-up faces.  The divine differences …

The procession around the church started with a slight hitch.  The priests and deacon and altar-boys went out first, and then the choir.  I didn’t know the music off by heart, and so looked around for someone who had sheet music.  The soprano and the other alto had already walked a little way ahead with their sheet music.  I turned and saw Unnameable Orthodox Guy holding out his sheet.  So we fell in step with each other, singing our harmonies.  I looked up and saw Fr. M. glancing at us.  Something about his expression made me think, Uh-oh.  It gave me a flashback to the first Pascha I ever went to – when P1 and Asterope were just starting to date, and I was their ride to church.  P1’s candle went out as we were processing around the church, and Asterope stopped and re-lit his candle for him.  I remembered, standing behind them, giving them a glance of "Awww … " – something similar, I imagined, to Fr. M’s glance at U.O.G. and me sharing the sheet music.  Then the choir leader gave me my own paper and I was able to move up to the other girls and U.O.G. had his music to himself again.

[Note: U.O.G. and I had the "Define The Relationship" talk months ago and the result was Friends; and there is another subplot afoot which I won’t get into because I don’t want to tell a story that won’t go anywhere.  And I don’t know yet if it will.  So that’s that.  I just worry sometimes that our priest looks at us and thinks "Aha!  A match!"]

Near the end of the service (so, at around 1 a.m. … ), Fr. M. warned us to make a path for him because he was about to get to the part where he goes into the other room to bless all the baskets of food.  When he did, I watched through the open door as he swished around in his vestments, shaking holy water all over the place, practically yelping the blessing with glee.  He did a lot of stuff in triplicate and this time, when he got to the third time, he fumbled on some of the words, and he ended up saying, "Bless this – this STUFF, in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit … "  Then he ran back into the main church, whooping loudly amidst our laughter.  At the altar, he handed the holy water dispenser to Fr. P, a sometimes stern Russian priest.  Fr. M. turned around to us again to go on with the service, and suddenly Fr. P., grinning, popped up from behind the curtain (I couldn’t help thinking of Muppets) and sprinkled holy water on Fr. M, who was not expecting it.

And then we sat down (oh, to SIT!) to a delirious, almost demented picnic of sorts …

Outside in the gravel lot, saying goodbye next to our cars, people starting picking each other up and twirling them around out of sheer high spirits (I’m afraid I started that.  Mom told me the other day not to do that to guys because it turns them off – because it’s not ladylike, and it undermines their manhood, or something).

—–

As of last Saturday, I own an apartment and have a mortgage.

—–

… No, no subplot.  I will resist.