Since most of my family is in Indiana, I don't often get to see them this time of year. The last Easter I spent back home was in '04. Here's a page from my diary from that happy holiday...

Sunday, April 11, 2004, 10:17 AM

This morning [my sister-in-law] dropped off Easter eggs for the Easter egg hunt here. There must’ve been 150 of the friggin things in the bag. I had agreed to play Easter bunny and hide them outside, though there's nothing but lawn as far as the eye can see to hid them in. I roped off the garden, but that’s no guarantee they won’t stomp around in it in their mad search for filthy lucre.

When I was a kid we had real eggs that we dyed and painted and so on. Kids are too busy these days to be bothered, apparently. Dying eggs has become one of those "jobs Americans won't do." And then, of course, there's the issue of what to do with all those hard-boiled eggs once you find them. Eat them? No way. And you can't exchange them for cash and prizes. What's the point?

So needless to say, the eggs my sister-in-law dropped off weren’t real eggs. They were plastic ones you open up to find goodies inside. Candies and toys and, yes, money. Even Easter is an orgy of greed. Once I realized there was money in some of them, I held back ten percent for me. If you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em, I say.

My prediction for the afternoon? It will end in tears, a great wailing and gnashing of teeth, and a cry will go up from the decimated lawn: ‘BUT IT’S NOT FAIR!’ That’s my prediction.

5:32 PM

Well, I was right. Children so seldom surprise you, after you get over the initial novelty of them. [My eleven year-old niece] E-1 whined and when she couldn’t find any more eggs, moped around watching the others and crying, "but it’s not fair!"

She started it even before the actual hunt began. When they arrived, she was complaining to her mother that [her brother] T. had been cheating, since he’d spied a few eggs on the way in. She very clearly felt he should be disqualified.

I can't say I disagree, but on other grounds. I mean, he’s almost thirteen. I think the Jews are very clever with their bar mitzvah, not only because the kid gets all sorts of money and whatnot, but because it plainly demarcates where boyhood ends and manhood begins and institutionalizes certain expectations of adulthood. Maybe we should have one of those ‘faux mitzvahs’ I’ve been hearing about for gentiles.

As it is all we gentiles expect from teens is that they’ll be sulky and sarky all the time. And if those are our expectations, they are sure to be met. Without a lot of guidance sulky, sarky kids become sulky, sarky adults, don’t they? He’s already practicing. I suppose T’s a good enough kid, though in a certain light he bears a striking resemblance to Nosferatu, at least in my opinion.

Anyway, they came back in after their mad hunt, bruised and battered from the battle, but eager to crack open all their eggs and count up their booty. Despite all her complaining, E-1 had ten more eggs (31) than her nearest competitor, [nine year old] E-2. T. had been limited to twenty by his mother (on account of his advanced age and skill), and [four year old] N.’s count didn’t really count, since he’d had loads of help from us adults.

E-1 set about separating the goodies she wanted to keep and those she wanted to trade with a fierce intensity. She was agitating N. to hurry up opening his so that she could trade him her wacky taffy for his tootsie rolls. She hates wacky taffy she announced.

We had a rather sad lunch – which left everyone hungry – a function of allowing someone on The Atkins Diet (mom) to plan the festivities.

After lunch and a brief visit from relatives, the kids went about their own business, more or less. They were impudent – it was their day and they knew it.

N. had gotten a little rubber ball in one of his eggs, and E-2 took him out to the driveway to play with it. It kept bouncing into the street. I told them not to play there, so with a cry of "you're not the boss of me!" they ran next door and played in the neighbor's driveway instead, bouncing the ball into the street from there.

Later N. wanted to toss a coin in the little birdbath in the garden, and I told him he should make a wish when he does. Apparently all coins are pennies to him, because he threw two nickels and a dime in, and was under the impression all three were pennies, which is something to exploit if one of the kids is clever enough.

N. kept tossing his "pennies" in, and before he did I’d say, make a wish, and he’d say OK, and then toss one in, and then I’d say, did you make a wish? and he’d say, no. This went on until we reached about a buck fifty in the birdbath, and then finally he made a wish that had something to do with being Spiderman when he grew up, I think.

N. was clearly getting too much attention, and E-2 wanted to get in on it. So she comes out of the house with about twenty-five bucks in pennies that she was prepared to toss into the birdbath one by one. I was going to come out ahead today, at least.

When I asked E-2 what she’d wished for, she said, "that God would be with her forever." She’s like one of those kids you see carrying signs outside the State House reading "Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve". She looks up at you like one of those little monsters from Village of the Damned and smiles that weird smile and says, "I wish God will be with me forever and ever and never leave me."

I’m like, "well, that was a waste of a wish." I mean, God's going to do whatever God wants to do, besides. He practically invented the phrase "you're not the boss of me!"

She tossed in more pennies, and said, "this time I wished Jesus would stay with me."

I pictured a pajama party. Rice Crispie Treats, My Pretty Pony, and pillow fights with Jesus. Braiding his hair. Playing The Sims: Bustin' Out! all night long. Poor Jesus.

I tossed in a penny, and said, "when Jesus and you have your little sleep-over, I wish that Jesus will tell you what he really thinks of you."

N. ran in the house past us yelling, "I wish Jesus would die!" Earlier he’d announced to everyone, "Jesus is alive!" And grandma was like, "yes, that’s right N." And then he said, with the same enthusiasm, "Now Jesus is dead!" "Oh, no!" said grandma. So N. said, "Jesus is alive!" Grandma smiled. "Jesus is dead!" Grandma frowned. And this went on for a good twenty minutes, to the point where we were seriously concerned grandma may have had a stroke, before N. finally pulled down his pants and announced, "I'm a girl!" Then recovered himself, and tore off into the garden.

There's something to be said for holidays with the family, but friends are fun, too, and there's no stress involved. I'd made plans with my buddy Robert, whose people are all in Louisiana and Texas. We'd called around to some restaurants on Saturday to see if we couldn't get in somewhere for Sunday brunch, but every place we called was pretty much booked up. So we ended up going to Mr. Crepe, which worked for me. They have a crepe with lamb and goat cheese and all sorts of fresh veggies that was perfect.

Then we went for a drive. We had no particular destination in mind, and every intersection we'd get to Robert would say, "right, left, or straight ahead?" Eventually we ended up at Wilson Farms in Lexington, where the highlight (aside from all the fabulous spring flowers in the greenhouse, of course) was the livestock.


Few things are more delightful then fresh-hatched chicks, that's for sure.

After we left Wilson Farms, we took a few more rights (I was inclining toward the right this morning, for some reason) and ended up at the De Cordova. There was a delightful new sculpture in the yard both Robert and I loved:


That's aside from my old faves, the tree sharks:


Then it was back home, passing through Waltham and past Gore Place on the way, where we discovered our program for the last weekend in April (mark your calendars!):


And after that, a nap was all that was needed to make this The Perfect Easter Sunday.