More Easter Tragedies

"I am not a monster; I am a BUNNY!" We had ONE barely warm afternoon last week, but it was too much for Peter Rabbit, who was hiding in the trunk of our car. I didn't discover the tragedy until tonight, of course, so crisis intervention was necessary and substitutions found.






When I was about seven, my much older sister was about 19 and suggested, to my horror, that we have fruit in our Easter baskets instead of candy. Can you imagine? She probably doesn't remember it, but let me tell you, I saw my life flash before my eyes. Huge cognitive dissonance occured for me because I thought she ruled everything, and usually would have gone along with whatever she said. But no little chocolate eggs? I couldn't go along with that. So I think we ended up with oranges and chocolate eggs.

At age nine, I was selected to sing a solo at Easter mass. David was to sing the first verse of "I Am the Resurrection", I was to sing the middle verse, and Dennis was assigned the third verse. The children's shoir sang the chorus. So there I was, in this huge church packed with people, in my pretty blue Easter dress with curled hair. David, Dennis and I stood at the front of the choir. David sang his part, we sang the chorus and I stepped up the microphone, opened my mouth....and started singing the verse David had just sung. When I realized what I'd done, I gasped and threw my hands over my mouth. The director, our fourth grade teacher, was playing the guitar and hissed, "Keep singing! Keep singing!" So I stepped back up and started over with the correct verse*. Fortunately, the organ player was a versatile and adaptable eight grader and he was able to compensate. Afterward, everyone told me that I did such a good job recovering that no one could tell. Looking back, I find that hard to believe, but everyone really united in a rare show of solidarity to convince me that no one noticed.

The first Easter we were in our house, I got G. an Easter basket as usual and hid it. He found it, turned pink, thanked me, and excused himself. He rustled around a bit, and then told me I could look for my Easter basket. What I found was a basket grabbed hastily from the garage with 2 cans of Diet Coke thrown in it. I thought it was funny, so every year since then, I insist he put Diet Coke in my Easter basket.

*Which, by the way, is firmly embedded in my brain now, never to be forgotten again: "In this world, all men shall come to know; it is love that makes the spirit grow. If you believe, then you shall live." I believe it has been changed, though, to "In his word, we all shall come to know..." Odd that the one girl chosen to sing was given the "all men" line, back when we were politically incorrect. Perhaps my bohemian teacher was trying to make a statement. She was a bit of a loose cannon - I wouldn't put it past her.