It’s Marci Gras! I did my part to make sure Fat Tuesday lived up to its name by making and eating an absurd amount of gumbo and cornbread. I’ve never been to the Mardi Gras festival, but I have been to New Orleans, and our hotel was right on Bourbon Street, and we visited the Mardi Gras museum to see the floats. I was also traveling with my 7-year-old at the time, so I had to be somewhat prudent. Anyhow, I was watching the news this morning about New Orleans and how there is no parade because of Covid, but houses and yards are decorated to the nines. One interviewee said, “The parade may be cancelled, but the spirit of Marci Gras cannot!” And that is when I got teary-eyed.

I don’t know about you, but I hope post-Covid celebrations rush in like someone opened the floodgates. Potential memories are being stolen from us. Sweet memories of passing out cupcakes on your birthday or Valentines to your classmates were erased like a chalkboard this past year. Dancing like nobody’s watching on a crowded amphitheater lawn is only a hallucination. Singing the school fight song with 109,000 other fans in the university stadium must have been a figment of my imagination. Hugging and holding hands? Only in our wildest dreams. Festivals, reunions, and play dates are all fictional chapters of our now boring lives. Gosh, I even fantasize about struggling to get the bartender’s attention during happy hour!

I hope when we become a herd again, we become immune to boredom. I hope we flock together and have a parade. A day of parades all over the world with singing and dancing, and everyone has a seat together at the grandstand with a perfect view of the spectacle. But the timing of these Mardi Gras celebrations will be reversed, because we’ve been abstaining for too long, as if we’d given up togetherness for lent. It’s time for the spirit of Mardi Gras that has been hibernating in our hearts to wake up, take a real good stretch, and let the good times roll!