"Take out" Fasting and Sacrifice

Fast food restaurants, drive-in banking, and all the options opened by the new I-pad 3 have set us on a track that even the Acebo, our fast train from Boston to DC can't match. We've become accustomed to a fast-track life. Well, perhaps not fully accustomed, but certainly influenced by it: spontaneity and speed go hand in hand with the rising and setting of the sun.
As we try to remain steadfast in our Lenten observances, interventions of unplanned requests, or underestimated times for completing projects bite into our resolves and reduce them to crumbs, it seems. Being on our fast track, there seems to be no way to recoup our lost prayers, penances and sacrifices. But there is. The very inconvenience, the frustration the apparent failure to keep our promises because we have responded to these unplanned "take out orders" on our time can themselves be our offering to God, the occasion for giving God what HE came to the window to buy from us: a willing, compassionate heart that is not tied to the letter of the law or to the observances we have set for ourselves. When the Scribes and Pharisees chided Jesus for curing (working!) on the Sabbath, he reminded them of how they led their animals to water and fed them on the Sabbath with no qualms of conscience. Was the not cure more valuable than the obeservance of the "no work" mandate? So, when we have the opportunity to be kind, charitable, at the disposal of another even at the price of not saying all of that promised daily rosary, are we not living the spirit of Lent, are we not putting into practice what we hope to achieve by our prayer? Flexibility rather than rigid observance is needed in molding us more and more into the image of God in whom we were created and seek to become by our Lenten fasting and prayer. If we are lifting our hearts to God as we serve others, if we are "giving up" our Lenten "program" on occasion to bring healing, comfort and compassion to others, are we not fulfilling the purpose of Lent?
Bro. Rene