The desert sand is not under our feet but in our hearts.  Its grit is the daily irritations and indefinable loneliness we often feel.  We need these Lenten weeks of heightened awareness of the importance of uncluttered spiritual and physical space we can discover the beauty of God and our sisters and brothers under the surface sands of our busy lives.  We may then become much wiser about the spiritual baggage that we as wilderness travelers, need to keep or discard in the trek toward Easter.