Easter Sunday

The sun lights up my front window on this Easter morning and I find myself lost in memories as I watch the little gray squirrel gamboling in the grass on the boulevard. 

The bushes outside my window are just budding.  Their bright green nubs reminding me of our bushes when I was a child.  I will miss this neighborhood, it tied me to my childhood in Springfield, Illinois where I lived in a neighborhood similar to this one near Washington Park.

Wide concrete sidewalks, gnarly old trees along the boulevards and in the yards, large shady porches and windows big enough to light up a room from sunrise to sunset, these houses were built to be lived in. 

I wonder how many children have colored Easter Eggs here, or searched for them as if they were solid gold?  I remember that terrible anticipation that kept me awake the night before as I lay in bed listening for the Easter Bunny, thinking I would never go to sleep.

Easter morning dawned way before my parents were ready to rise, but they did, so we could rush downstairs and find our baskets full of eggs and candy!  The carrot we left on the note thanking him would have two huge teeth marks in it and I remember envisioning this giant creature who showed up once a year to bring us candy.  I, who would walk a block out of my way to avoid the little dogs on the way to my piano lesson, had no fear of a six foot white rabbit.  (Which is how I saw him.)

Shiny patent leather shoes and purses, white gloves, big billowy skirts and a hat, always a hat so we could sing, "In your Easter bonnet" made the day perfect. 

Relatives began arriving late in the morning for the Easter ham and deviled eggs.  The aroma of fresh baked rolls made my mouth water and I played with my candy making nests in the green plastic grass, creating scenario after scenario like I would for the next week until my sister sneaked all the candy away for herself.  I seldom ate any of it except for a few chocolate eggs and maybe the chocolate bunny, but that never dulled the joy.

If it rained on Easter Sunday we knew it would rain for the next seven Sundays.  We were full of traditions and superstitions and bursting with a zest for life that belongs mostly to the very young.