Bunnies, chocolate eggs, and emergency lights: Easter is coming

 This is Holy Week, that time when the Christian church remembers its foundations in the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. We have many ways of remembering and celebrating this season.

Here in the retirement community, the Market Place has announced a special Holy Week sale, and highlights three items at good prices: bunnies, chocolate eggs, and emergency lights. An interesting combination.

The Market Place is a small convenience and variety store, run by residents and stocked with practical stuff like toilet paper, toothpaste, aspirins, and Snickers bars. It comes in handy when I realize at the last moment that I need a birthday card.

The list of Easter specials—bunnies, chocolate eggs, and emergency lights—reminds me of those tests that have you read a list (or look at pictures—an apple, a banana, and a pencil, for example) and say which item doesn’t fit. With the Easter sale list, that’s easy. The bunnies don’t fit. Both the emergency lights and the chocolate are helpful in facing danger and trauma. The bunnies, not so much.

This reminds me of the delightful customs of Easter I grew up with. I remember my first Easter egg hunt, mostly because I did it wrong and got in trouble. I was three-years-old and my parents brought me to a community hunt. The little kids, the one and two-year-olds, were supposed to go first through the gate and into the garden. But as soon as the gate opened, I ran in, ahead of everyone. I wasn’t really greedy, just excited. (I don’t actually remember my motives. I’m guessing.) My parents had to rush in, pick me up, and carry me back in front of everyone. I remember it and feel a stab of shame even now, although I don’t think it’s scarred me for life.

All the other Easter egg hunts in my childhood were positive. We three kids anticipated it, received our baskets with excitement, and ran around in the yard like rabbits, looking under every leaf and bush. I do remember some disappointment when the loot was mostly hardboiled eggs, with one small chocolate bunny that turned out to be hollow in the middle. But, other than that, it was the highlight of Easter. (My folks weren’t that into church in those days.)

We carried on the custom with our kids. One of the most fun parts was the afternoon we spent together coloring the eggs, dipping them into bowls of colored water and painting faces or stripes on them. Of course, that killed the myth of the Easter Bunny, but that was fine with us. We still had fun hiding the eggs and the kids finding them. With a few surprise chocolate rabbits thrown in.

Here on our floor in the retirement community, residents have decorated their apartment entrances for the Easter season. Lots of rabbits, chicks, and eggs. It’s cheery and spring-like, if not particularly holy.

Aside from the colorful cultural customs of Easter, and running deeper, the events of Holy Week so many years ago continue to be relevant. Many of us are following the footsteps of Jesus day by day on his journey to the cross, and then, the resurrection. The devotional app I’m following calls the whole season of Lent one of a “bright sadness.” Sorrow and joy mingle in our reflections. This is the bedrock of our faith.

May the Spirit be with you as you walk slowly through this week.

Even if you are accompanied by bunnies, chocolate eggs, and emergency lights.