I feel sheepish

So... I work in a cubicle, a gray cubicle that would depress me if I didn't have pictures of my family and friends on it and if I didn't have my beautiful bamboo to look at. Just about everyone on this floor is in a cubicle. And we have our own little areas where we we are combined with other departments or people who do things different then say what my department does. So there is a girl that sits on the other side of our little area who is in a different department, but I see her enough to know who she is and say hi to her and all that courteous stuff. She's a very pretty girl- probably my age, has long blond hair and is fit and you can tell is okay with herself, but not in a bad way. Well, she walked by me just a few minutes ago and I noticed that there was a big black smudge all across her forehead. So thinking to myself, she's got to know that she's got that on there, sure I'm not the only one that's noticed- unless of course it JUST happened! I wondered if she got into some ink or a pen broke and she accidentally wiped in on her forehead and now it wont come off... all of this crossed my mind in the three seconds time I looked at her and softly grabbed her arm and said in a low tone "did you know you had black stuff on your forehead?" to which she replied sort of disgustingly "yes, it's Ash Wednesday...". Whoops... I felt pretty embarrassed and apologized and she assured me I wasn't the first to ask, but still seemed bothered by my lack of knowledge.

Now I've heard of it, but seeing as though it's not something I practice in my religion I wasn't sure of the "rules or procedures" or the symbolism behind it. So I looked Ash Wednesday up in wikipedia.org because I wanted to be a little more educated and more informed about it. I really feel that living in a such a diverse area of the world that it's my it's responsibility to become more informed. I love the different religious or personal beliefs that people choose to live by. I am grateful for what I choose to believe and know that in my heart it is true. But just because I know that, doesn't give me the right to be ignorant about my brothers and sisters who don't know or believe the same way I do. I may not always agree with it, but a lot of people don't agree with my religion either. President Hinckley advises us to be tolerant of other religions because there is good in every one.
I now know that next time I see a smudge on someones forehead on a Wednesday that it's probably a religious thing and that I shouldn't be nice and say anything! But believe me, if it's any other day of the week- I will!