OPINION: The rites of Spring
Easter is a most peculiar holiday, which is saying something, considering so many other religious festivities litter our calendar. For instance, it’s the only one with pink and lavender decorations. Also, no other holy day shares such an obsession with hardboiled eggs, chocolate bunnies, jellybeans and plastic grass. And it boasts a singular connection to bonnets.
Another odd aspect is Easter’s ability to travel, falling on the Sunday after the first full moon following the Vernal Equinox. Meaning it can roll from March 22 to April 25. It’s sort of like your weird Aunt Hazel who visits every year about this time, but can’t commit to a date until she nails down the cheapest bus ticket.
The celebration goes back, back, back to olden timey days when our pagan ancestors paid homage to a goddess named Esther who was prone to dance to honor the season of fertility and had a proclivity for hanging out with bunnies, which sort of explains the egg connection. The egg being a symbol of fecundity with the promise of abundance. Be fruitful and multiply. Bringing us back to the bunnies. Chocolate seems to have been a recent addition. And not an altogether bad one.