Tomorrow is the last day of the Fast, and ho tian is Nawruz, the Baha'i New Year. It's around this time every year that I wish the Fast would go on for longer. Sure, my mouth and tummy would love to eat chips and salsa at whim, but I want the specialness to continue. What happened to my plans to pray like five hours a day during the Fast?!

We always had traditions associated with the Fast - the special plates we used in the mornings, the food we ate for breakfast ("fast food" - the things that keep you chugging through the day). Just the fact that we ate breakfast together was something different from the rest of the year when we ran in different directions carrying various foods in our hands. Even when I lived alone, and now that I'm married, I carry on some of those traditions.

I was thinking the other day that this has been a good Fast for me. I've been able to fast without getting sickly, a problem of the past two years. I've bonded with Sam at the breakfast table. More importantly, I've generally walked around with a happy shiny feeling. Let it continue past sunset tomorrow.

...Thou hast endowed every hour of these days with a special virtue, inscrutable to all except Thee, Whose knowledge embraceth all created things.....