Easter Shoe Boxes

Easter 2010 has come and gone, but not without leaving its memories along with the sting we feel....the absent one, my sister.  Holy week was a difficult one this year, in the sense that as our brunch was being planned; I wanted to talk with Chrissy about the details as we usually do.  Looking at the holiday in that way was sad, and I found myself quiet, finding time to reflect, cry but also be grateful......grateful for Jesus Christ.....grateful for the years and days I did have with my sister......grateful for friends that understand.......grateful for my husband and children who bring me joy.....some frustration at times (chuckle) but overwhelming gratefulness to God for my family, friends and our fun times. 

Most think that Christmas is the pivotal time in our faith, if you are one to believe in religion.  The pinnacle of our faith is Easter, though.  It clarifies the reason and answer to our existence.  If you believe that life goes beyond death, which I do, then Easter should bring us joy and hope.  I don't always understand the sufferings that go with life; yet, in suffering comes wisdom.  Perhaps that is what we are meant to do......come into ourselves......come into wisdom. 

Our Meyer Easter brunch was held on its usual Saturday, the day before Easter.   After mom past to her new life back in '86, this tradition started to help accommodate our families so that we could gather without leaving so quickly to celebrate Easter with our inlaws.  It gave us more time to hang out, and just be in the moment and enjoy our time together.  The 100 plus Easter eggs were filled with goodies;  hidden after we ate our traditional favorites of "white weenies", fried potatoes with milk gravy, egg casseroles, fried eggs, bacon, biscuits, pancakes and of course fruit salad.  We have to have some healthy options, don't we?  Then the additional meal was prepared a few hours later after the bruch food settled.  We had our baked ham, potato casserole, chips and relish tray, and let's not forget the healthy part - the salad.  We traditionally call them white weenies, but most people call them buckwish or bockwurst.   Not sure which one, but all I know is that one year our Frank, the Italian in-law, was respnsible for buying the white weenies.  Chrissy forgot to mention to him that the real name of this peculiar meat was buckwish.  Needless to say, when Frank asked for white weenies, the butcher gave him a puzzled look.  The Meyer family had a good laugh at Frank's expense that year. 


 Although I shed some tears leading to this event, knowing this would be the first of many Easters without my sister, I have hope and faith in new life beyond this one.  Thinking about this day approaching brought back so many fun memories.  I imagined Chrissy in her little Easter dress along with the rest of kids gathered around mom and dad.  We would make our trips to Granny's house (my mom's mom) and then to Aunt Louise's house on my dad's side, having our traditional Easter egg hunts.  I, myself, getting knocked over by the rush of the older kids on a mission.  Dad's mom had past on at a young age, way before I was born, so Aunt Louise took over those responsibilities on our Meyer side.  On the Lafser side there was the traditional finding of our Easter Shoe Box, which as we grew older, became one of my most  treasured holiday experiences.  Grandma wouldn't use the typical Easter baskets.   She would use shoe boxes filled with our favorite treats every year.  Picture, if you will, a shoe box filled with the fake Easter grass, a white hard-boiled egg (no color) with our names written on the egg and every year most of our names were traditionally spelled wrong.  We saw our grandparents on a weekly basis, but they never seemed to remember that "Kurt" was actually spelled with a "C", "Denny" was spelled "Deni" and I believe she spelled Chrissy's name using a "K".   Susie and I had the honor of having our names spelled right.  Now that I come to think of it.....she may have spelled Susie's name like "Suzy".  So I was the chosen one!  Along with the white egg would be the marshmellow egg covered in chocolate and some chocolate eggs and I think there may have been some Peeps in there, too.  We were sent off to look for these shoe boxes every year; even into our teen years, and what a treat that was!  We would laugh so hard being as old as we were, hunting for our baskets that Grandma loved to create.  My grandma did that every year for us until the day she died.  I know my older siblings had to be into their twenties.  It was so much fun!  It just goes to show that memories are worth so much so go make some yourselves.  Your families, your kids, your grandkids will be forever grateful.

"You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life."

                                             -Jiddu Drishnamurti