Easter Blues

Easter. East-er. Ea-ster. No matter how I pronounce it, it is still my least favorite holiday. I do not like eggs, I do not like rabbits, and I can't find any bonnets that fit me; I hate Easter. And it's not as if my hatred of this holiday stems from one big grudge like the time the Easter Bunny gave me rabies. No, my dislike for it is as all-encompassing as it is rampant.

First, it's the one holiday with no distractions. With Christmas, you have presents; with Thanksgiving, you have food; with the Halloween, you have peeing on the door step of the people who gave you a box of raisins. But with Easter, all you have is your extended family and a bunch of hard-boiled eggs. How does that even count as a holiday? And so, without a good distraction, you are left with family members who see each other twice a year, getting into a fistfight over a sleeping bag. Just so there's something, there ought to be a customary game of Easter kickball. If you strike out, you're pelted with eggs and disowned.

Second, I have had some bad egg hunt experiences. In my family, we always had these massive egg hunts across some fields at my grandparents' ranch. It was really competitive as to who found the most eggs, which didn't work well for me. I cannot find a pair of pants in my 500 sq ft apartment; there's no way on earth I'm finding an egg in an enormous pasture, even if there are a bunch of them. And on the very rare occasion when I somehow snuck into the top standings of the egg hunt (generally through some combination of cheating and family pity), my prize would be something horribly inappropriate. Imagine me at 8 years old, asthmatic and allergenic as hell, busting my ass across the boonies of East Texas for some eggs, in the hopes of getting a really cool prize at the end. Somehow, I sneeze and wheeze my way into 2nd place and what do I get? A jug of antifreeze. Happy Easter!

I could continue with this list for the rest of day, but I'm not going to. For the first time in a few years, my family is doing the Easter thing again; I see it as a new start for me and Easter. Now that I've purged my angst, I'm going to try to go in there happy, well-adjusted, and ready to win some antifreeze. Wish me luck.