Smells and Bells

  Sacraficial Smell Last year I started meeting 1-1 with an InterVaristy staff for mentorship and descipling. Our relationship formed from a conversation I had with her under the impression I would see her maybe once or twice more before graduating. I had been introduced to her a few times at different events, but she staffed a different campus and was only at Wheaton for the day. I had recently returned from a very difficult study abroad. I was entirely disillusioned with my school work and felt only stress when I thought about Wheaton’s Christian fellowship which I was leading. I was in need of serious rest. I let the staff know all of these things because I thought there would be no consequences. She however, had a lot more flexibility in her schedule than I was aware of and committed to meeting with me for direction for as long as I wanted up until graduation. One of the first things we ended up speaking about was Sabbath. I was not aware of the Sabbath as a spiritual practice...

This reading has probably been one of my favorites so far, not because of the fact that it is about taste necessarily, but because it discusses a kind of food that I enjoy while many others do not. It also discusses it in a wonderfully graphic way which, as someone who has spent a lot of time in many different kitchens, I find very entertaining. The description of Arlene and the elders dissecting the poultry actually made me hungry while it probably did the exact opposite for other readers. I have a love for eating the innards of animals, specifically poultry. I am not the kind of person who would eat brains, that freaks me out, but I am the kind of person who loves haggis. Haggis, for those of you who don't know, is a sheep's heart, liver, and lungs, minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, mixed with stock, and traditionally encased in the animal's stomach and boiled. Maybe I like it because I am Scottish but not all Scottish people actually like haggis. I...