Day 1: Body Fluids are Flowing

As a newer stay-at-home mom, I have been having close encounters with bodily fluids much more often. My toddler has been literally snot-nosed for the last three weeks. Those streams of mucus began flowing the morning after he spewed chunks of macncheese vomit on my hair, pajamas, pillow and sheets in the middle of the night. Last week, Douwe cut open his lip in two places after a stumble landed him face first into the ceramic pot of a houseplant. Within thirty seconds his clothes, my clothes and three rags were stained with blood. My hands get chapped on these cold February Tuesdays (laundry day) after I use cold water and the Fels-Naptha bar at the laundry tub to scrub out various stains of nose-blood, lip-blood, menstrual blood, urine, diarrhea, snot-crust, and vomit from shirts, onsies and bed linens. This afternoon, I forgot to change the sub-par Target diaper which only last about 2 hours (Huggies can absorb about 6 hours worth of urine), so while peeling squished broccoli and corn morsels from Douwe’s crotch area after supper, I noticed his pants were soaked from waist to shins. A bathroom and a bedroom rug were sprinkled with pee, one before, and one right after Douwe’s bath.

Last month I wrote a poem in anticipation of the upcoming celebration of Easter, and not surprisingly, it is preoccupied with bodily fluids. Of all the fluids that spew forth from our various orifices, blood, of course, gets front and center in the Christian religion, so I am going to spend the next six weeks till Easter paying some more attention to that fact. What is it about blood anyway? What does that gory liquid have to do with faith, hope and love? Today is Ash Wednesday, and this is the first of 40 entries under the theme “A Desperate Housewife’s Bloody Lenten Devotional.”

Here’s a blood-focused hymn that many 20th century Christians have sung a few times:

What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

For my pardon, this I see, Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
For my cleansing this my plea, Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Nothing can for sin atone, Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
Naught of good that I have done, Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

This is all my hope and peace, Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
This is all my righteousness, Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Refrain: Oh, precious is the flow that makes me white as snow
No other fount I know, Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Robert Lowry 1876

Is that over the top? I'm not quite sure what to think. It does seem a bit undignified to sing a song that is all about blood.