Easter Memories - Sweet Moments in Time

The Boston Herald

It's different this year. There's no school schedule to keep me on track, so I find myself bumping into holidays. First it was Valentine's Day that caught me by surprise. Then it was St. Patrick's Day. Now it's Easter. How did it get to be  Easter already?

Years ago, there were precursors: decorations that would go up the first of March, Hallmark yellow chickens and pink bunnies taped to the kitchen cabinets; more chickens and bunnies drawn and colored at school then displayed on the refrigerator door; the Easter tree ("Can we put it up? Can we put it up?") laden with lollipops and surrounded by jelly beans.Then there was Easter shopping: new shoes for everyone, straw hats and white gloves for the girls.

When my children were small, I made their clothes. I was probably the worst seamstress ever. How many times can you sew a collar on backward? How many wrong ways are there to put in a sleeve? The process, therefore, took forever. When they got older, it was a lot quicker. A few weeks before Easter we'd go shopping and this too became a reminder that the holiday was near.

Then there was Sunday school, inching its way toward the Resurrection, with stories and papers that presage this day.

Easter morning I would be up and ready, eager to help the Easter Bunny spread M&Ms around the house. The children would wake to a trail of them leading from their rooms down the hall, down the stairs, through the kitchen, into the family room where their baskets awaited. Easter morning candy was the best breakfast of the year. They ate it in front of the TV. They always sat and watched "Davey and Goliath." Each Easter it was the same story. Davey's grandmother died and Davey was inconsolable until he realized that, just like Jesus, she would rise again.

The first time my oldest saw this episode, he was devastated. The story of the Resurrection may have stopped Davey's tears, but it didn't help my son. I don't think he ever thought about death until that day. He was little, five or six. Death was still a stranger. The story hit him hard. Seeing Davey, who was always having adventures with his dog, Goliath, suddenly lose the grandmother who was so much like his own grandmother, terrified him.

He didn't eat his candy that morning. He didn't eat anything. He  got dressed and sat on the couch, waiting to go to church. When we got there, he bolted from the car and ran up the walk and into the church foyer where his grandmother was lining up with the choir. He pushed through dozens of legs until he found her and when he did, he finally smiled.

"Is Grandma going to die?" he asked later.  "Everyone dies eventually," I told him.

"I don't want Grandma to die," he said.

"I know," I answered.

All the time he was a boy, he never missed that Easter morning  "Davey and Goliath." They all watched it, the three of them in their pajamas, lined up on the couch like chess pieces, each in his own square, their Easter baskets on their laps.

Now all three are grown. Now we can't throw M&Ms on the stairs because, Molly, the black lab, would devour them. And we can't have an Easter tree because Molly would eat that, too. I don't even know if "Davey and Goliath" is on anymore. "Are you sure you don't mean 'Davey and the Gargoyles'?" my godson asks. 

Easter is different this year.

Not bad, mind you, just different. We still have each other. And we still have Grandma. Easter has just changed. There are things I miss about the old days: frilly dresses, patent-leather shoes, Easter baskets, Grandma in the choir, high-pitched giggles.

But there are things I like about now: I like the adults my children have become. I like that they no longer poke each other in church. I like that my son no longer complains about having to wear a tie. I like that no one spills milk anymore. I like that we get along. And I like that on this Easter Sunday we will all be together again.