As a select few may have noticed, the Season of Lent began on Wednesday, February 17 and runs through Thursday April 1.
Here in Pagosa Springs, the celebration — if you can call the consumption of fish a ‘celebration — traditionally includes the Knights of Columbus ‘Friday Fish Fry’ held at the Catholic Parish Hall on Lewis Street. The main dish, in years past, has been deep-fried catfish.
From what I can discern, based on a frantic search of the internet, the Lenten Fish Fry will not be held this year in Pagosa. Due to COVID concerns, no doubt.
Which leaves the rest of us with limited options.
I acquired about the custom of eating fish on Fridays when I got together with my second wife, Darlene. When I met her, Darlene had angrily renounced her Catholic heritage and, as part of the repudiation process, had seemingly dedicated herself to committing every possible venial sin in the Catechism, and a few of the mortal sins as well.
That is, of course, what made her so attractive.
Being myself raised by atheist parents, I didn’t really understand how liberating it might feel, to reject one’s guilt-drenched upbringing.
But, for some unknown reason, Darlene still insisted on eating fish on Fridays.
She was especially fond of sardines with soda crackers. The ones packed in olive oil.
Being myself raised by atheist parents, I had never eaten sardines with soda crackers. My exposure to a piscatorial diet consisted mainly of Gordon’s frozen fish sticks, excessively baked in the oven. (For some weird reason, my mom always got a phone call from her sister whenever she put the fish sticks in the oven, resulting in a platter full of dark brown rectangles with a flavor similar to rubber erasers.)
As you might well imagine, our two family traditions were somewhat incompatible. No one would ever think of eating Gordon’s frozen fish sticks on soda crackers, nor would anyone in their right mind bake canned sardines in the oven.
Of course, Darlene had a strong religious backing for her choice. As she would often explain during our Friday arguments over what to have for dinner, sardines come from the Mediterranean region, and the Catholic Church also arose in the Mediterranean region. The olive oil contributed to her argument as well.
Atheism, in Darlene’s view, arose from nowhere at all, a point which I found it difficult to rebut. And the codfish in the frozen fish sticks were harvested in the north Atlantic — not exactly a hotbed of Catholic conscription.
But marriage is all about compromise. We worked out a schedule that alternated between sardines and fish sticks on consecutive Fridays.
Following the divorce, I realized I’d become fond of sardines, and would find myself eating them even on Mondays, or any other day of the week.
It’s somewhat cathartic to finally admit, publicly, that Darlene was right all along.