ROBIN WRITES: Easter Snapshot
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Easter Sunday is a burst of joy wrapped in purple cellophane. It is bright sunlight on tiny leaves and white tights on wiggly little legs and dye-stained fingers fussing with freshly washed hair.
From the first peek of Easter morning’s resurrection, there is excitement in the air.
Children wake, eyes gleaming in candy-coated anticipation, and stumble/run into the kitchen. They smile; the room glows. Wicker baskets full of plastic grass wait just for them—filled with chocolate animals, sticky jellybeans, and neon-yellow marshmallow chicks.
Candy robin’s eggs, covered with brilliant blue foil, share grassy nests with blush-colored hair barrettes, stripey-green Pixy Stix, and eggs dyed rainbow hues.
This is the first glory of each Easter morning: the delight and purity of wonder that only children possess. They rake through the grass in their baskets, digging for hidden treasure.
Flimsy plastic toys pop to the surface: yoyos the size of quarters, miniature bottles of bubbles, tops that spin with exasperating effort and wobbly inconsistency.
None of these treats will last beyond the day. They will be lost or broken or tossed aside. But it doesn’t matter. The seconds of happy memories they create will last a lifetime.
Chocolate for breakfast…with hard-boiled eggs. Moms and dads help wash sticky little hands that have grown from pudgy little fists to open palms and ragged cuticles, and marvel at the speed of life.
Then sunlight streams time across the kitchen, and everyone rushes to get ready for church.
The bathroom mirror reflects all sizes and ages of faces. Freckled and wrinkled. Reluctant and eager. The scents of perfume and deodorant mingle with the acrid odor of egg-dyeing vinegar, creating a smell that will never be forgotten and always be tied to Easter.
New shirts as stiff as cardboard challenge buttoning fingers. Fresh-from-the-box shoes hold toes for the first time. Miniature neckties lasso fidgety boys, and matching ones adorn grudgingly-suited dads.
Little girls, delicately disguised in sweetness and lace, grin impishly as they swing shiny white patent leather purses full of sermon candy over their heads in halo-y circles.
And Mom, a surprise of butterfly-beauty, pops from her cocoon of everyday doing and loving and being. She glows in womanly beauty; her children gasp in delight to see this stranger/Mom. They hug her, and chocolate-smuggling fingerprints decorate her new dress with smudges of love.
She smiles motherly resignation, scolding and shooing them all to the car.
Church doors stand wide open, and families climb toward the warmth waiting there. The Cross. The Crown. Sadness. And the joy. The gift of forever that Christ provided with the dawn of Easter morning.
Music and words tell how He died and how “HE AROSE!” Hearts feel a new thrill of unmerited love as chocolate-breathy giggles of restless children hop happiness across wooden pews.
These are the moments of fullest life. Embraces of Easter that are as precious as the Love that rolled the stone away.
May your Easter morning be filled with childlike joy, quiet gratitude, and renewed faith.
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■ Robin is a freelance columnist who lives and writes in Quincy, Illinois. Contact her at [email protected].
